Halo: First Strike
by Gharst Omenlumin
Summary: Halo is destroyed, but the Chief and the other survivors of the ship still have to get back to human space, and Fol has to prove his new loyalty to humanity. meanwhile, on Reach, doctor halsey makes unsettling discoveries. (Rated M just to be save)
1. Chapter 1

**Hello, fellow readers of the story. If you haven't read my previous story Halo: The Flood, I highly suggest you do so, so you understand this story.**

 **No long introduction, no long explanation, just a request for reviews and a Disclaimer that I DO NOT OWN HALO**

 **NOW READ.**

* * *

Halo: First Strike Chapter 1

"Scan again." Fol said to the AI, whose avatar appeared on the display. She looked irritated, as he'd requested this multiple times.

But it was their only hope of getting out of this star system. Their fighter had no Slipspace drive, and unless they could find an intact larger ship, they were stuck here, to die in the debris field of Halo. Six was flying the Longsword through it, keeping away from the denser area's and giving the AI a lot of opportunities to scan.

"Unless we find a larger vessel to fly in, we'll be stuck here. We have no Slipspace drives, and our oxygen is limited. Same for our food and the energy needed to keep you alive. We have mere hours at most." Fol paused. "At least scan the field for Covenant pieces. Give us an approximate number of how many Covenant capital ships were destroyed."

The AI sighed, and went on to do her task. Fol was slightly perplexed by it. He had no experience with an AI with such an... personality. The Covenant employed AI's for sure, but they were all what the humans called 'dumb' AI. They had no sentience.

Then Cortana reported. "As usual, no active signals coming in. Just dust and echo's. The number of Covenant craft, in the initial scan, showed five Capital ships destroyed, including the _Truth and Reconciliation_.

Fol then smiled. "Then I've got good news _or_ bad news, depending on how you look at it."

"What is it?" Sergeant Johnson asked. Aside from him, Six and Fol, there were only three other Spartans aboard, John, Sam and Linda. Sam sat at the systems-ops seat, keeping his own eye out. Linda was laying down near the ramp, taking a rest so she could recover from injuries sustained over Reach. She had surgery performed on them multiple times, and was going on quite well for a woman who was supposed to be dead. But she hadn't had any time to recover from them, as they'd spent days fighting the Flood and Forerunner sentinels. And so she was now catching some shuteye. John was busy with Johnson taking account of all the weapons they had on board.

"We followed you with thirteen ships: One carrier, one support vessel and eleven cruisers. Good news if we want to get out of here, for they all have slipspace drives. Bad news because we are severely outgunned and outclassed, so boarding one of them will be tough."

"That's alright." Six said from the pilot's seat. "We've beaten worse odds on that ring. Namely against a telepathic monster, an army of religious fanatics, and a genocidal robot with an army of drones at his back." Six paused for a second. "And I've survived you."

"Very funny."

"You think I was joking, split-face?"

"No insult intended. I'm not yet as well-versed in human humor as I'd like to be."

Six nodded, and then looked back at the others. "How about our arms back there, boys? Anything good?"

"We're good as long as our fighting takes place inside one of those ships." Johnson started. "We've got a Mini-gun, a Rocket launcher, a Fuel-Rod gun, a Sniper Rifle, four Energy Swords, four Shotguns, a fully charged Plasma Repeater, two fully charged Plasma Rifles, an Energy Pistol that's about half drained, a Covenant Carbine, four Assault Rifles, and a whole lot of grenades. Plenty of ammo for all except the shotguns, which were used extensively back on the Autumn. Everything seems to be in working order."

Fol nodded, satisfied they had plenty of arms and ammunition.

"We've also got a Moray Mine system on board, which has 36 mines at the moment. Not a lot of use except to ambush any of those ships but s-"

"New contacts." Cortana interrupted. "Those Echo's I was talking about? They're getting stronger."

"Meaning?" Fol asked. He wasn't well versed in space combat, instead focusing on fighting in ground engagements. His sister, Nera, was much better at it.

"Meaning they're not Echo's." Six said. "They're your fleet, hiding behind that moon to protect themselves from Halo's destruction." she turned to the others. "Get Linda awake. Shut everything down except Live-Support and enough power to keep Cortana online. Get those weapons to their owners, and strap in."

they all nodded, and moved on along their assigned tasks. Fol looked around, and found a seat at the back of the cockpit. It was too small, and unlikely to hold his large body, but it would have to do. He sat down and strapped himself down, accepting his Fuel-Rod gun and swords from the Chief. Johnson handed him an Assault Rifle, and about six clips for it. Fol noted the weapon had already been reloaded, and he put it on his back holster.

The cockpit lights dimmed, and Cortana's hologram winked out, the systems to keep it on shut down.

Then Fol saw it. First three of the cruisers appeared, coming about and headed to the port side of the debris field. Then the Carrier, _Ascendant Justice_ , appeared. Then three more cruisers appeared from the back of the moon, moving to the other side of the debris field. But no support vessel showed up.

"Where's the _Infinite Succor_?" Fol asked. "It's the support vessel I talked about. Is it still behind the moon?"

"There's no more signals coming in." Cortana said. "But I'm scanning their Com signals right now." after a few moments she talked again. "According to sporadic messages, I've pieced this together: The Flood boarded the ship, and infected the crew. A Spec-ops team, led by a R'tas 'Vadum'ee, boarded the ship, took over engine room, and set a course to collide with this system's sun. R'tas was the only survivor, having escaped on an escape pod."

Fol nodded. They still had a lot of good choices, like the _Ascendant Justice_ , or the _Seeker of Truth_.

"Contact." Sam said. "Damn, that stupid asteroid just floated in. But it looked like a pelican dropship. Might be some others that got off of the ring. Maybe even 'are we there yet'."

"Don't worry." Cortana said. "I've got a good look recorded here." some footage appeared on the main display, and indeed, a Pelican dropship was on it. Cortana supplied the outline of a dropship for it. It was a near-perfect match, but only because the rest of the dropship wasn't visible.

"Definitely survivors." Linda said, as she moved into the cockpit. "They're parked so that they can easily take off instead of land."

"But we're still in the ideal place to be attacked from." Fol said.

Then something happened he hoped wouldn't. Couldn't.

His helmet com went off. The others all turned to him, and he saw Six slowly go for her Energy Sword. "What's that?" she asked.

"My Helmet com. But it's supposed to be offline."

"Answer it." The Chief said. "It'll look suspicious if you don't, and the fact your defection isn't wide-spread might give us the element of surprise."

Fol nodded, and pressed a button. He set it to audio-only. Then a voice echoed throughout the ship.

"Fol? Is that you?" a Sangheili said over the com. "This is Narsk Orthelk'ee. I'm in a Spirit headed for the Fleet. Where are you?"

Fol improvised for a second. "I'm aboard a spirit, drifting in the debris field."

"I see you. But I'm detecting a few humans aboard as well. And you ain't aboard it. Is something wrong with the scanner?"

Fol paused for a second. So more humans were alive, and coincidentally in a spirit as well. But Narsk thought he was aboard it as well, and there was no way he could reveal that to the Sangheili.

 _Unless..._

"I'm confusing the signals my Spirit emits. There's a human Vulture Gunship in the area, and I'm hiding from it. Head for the _Seeker of Truth_ , I'll be along shortly after it passes."

It seemed to work, and Narsk headed to one of the Cruisers. Six let go of the Energy Sword...

But then said cruiser turned towards him, and Fol saw it's plasma cannons charge. Then a new voice entered the conversation.

"Fol. Tell me. Is it true that you defected to the Demons' side?" Thel Vadam asked.

Fol stood rigid. This wasn't a multi-purpose pilot who could fly all aircraft the Covenant had, but the Commander of the Fleet of Particular Justice. Thel Vadam had successfully fought throughout the Human-Covenant war. He was experienced in both the political and the literal battlefield, and if he asked this kind of question, then he already knew the truth.

"If you ask that, then you know the answer. And you know that I wouldn't do this without good reason. Are you prepared to hear me out, or are you truly the new heel of the false Prophets, destined to become the new Arbiter?"

"If you come and face me, Coward, then I just might listen to your final words. But you're outgunned, outclassed and outnumbered. Do the right thing, and surrender."

"I'll come to the bridge." Fol subtly changed their channel, so it was an open was no way this could be hidden. "But it won't be in surrender. I will fight to the last, take the _Ascendant Justice_ , and kill all of you misguided fools if I have to. I have spoken to a Monitor, Thel, and it has shown me things. Things that could bring about the Great Schism. If you listen, then I will tell you those things as well, but if you choose to fight, then I will fight you, Thel."

There was a moment of silence, and Fol thought he had successfully convinced Thel.

But then the _Ascendant Justice_ moved in as well, and Fol knew he'd failed.

"So misguided." Thel said, though it seemed to be to himself more than Fol. "Goodbye, Katarn'ee."

Then the Cruiser aimed it's guns at her.

And missiles and plasma-shots struck the _Seeker of Truth_ in the turrets just as it lowered it's shields to fire. The Cruiser listed to starboard, towards the _Ascendant Justice_. The massive Carrier attempted to evade, but it's momentum prevented it from moving out of the way in time. The two ships collided, and sparks of shields passed between two of them.

Cortana reactivated the entire Longsword as this happened, and moved them through the debris-field. Fol saw from his seat that the Human-Captured Spirit and Pelican were following them as well, though the Spirit's driver seemed to be new to the controls. It made too wide and too sharp turns in order to dodge the debris.

The Chief opened a channel to their own forces. "This is Spartan 117. I'm aboard the Longsword. Who are manning the Pelican and Spirit, and How many are aboard?"

A male voice responded. "This is Warrant Officer Polaski. I'm manning the Pelican, and have two others aboard."

Then another channel opened. And arguing was heard loudly over it. "You could get us killed with this kind of flying." an Australian voice said. "Get us out of the Debris field. Now."

"And get blasted to pieces? No thank you. I like flying in cover, and since you can't fly, Chippie, You don't have a say in where we are bloody flying. Now shut up."

Most of those listening were now laughing. Johnson keyed in on the com. "Hey, Wilson! Are you there yet?" he yelled.

Wilson immediately responded. "Johnson! Still listening to that Flip bullshit, yah old bastard?"

"It's better than your 'Epic' crap."

"Then you haven't heard enough of it yet. How many are there aboard on your Longsword?"

At this point the Chief took over. "Wilson, we have Six on board, including our Elite friend."

"The Bloody bastard's alive? Damn. I thought the little Spartan would have gutted him long ago."

"I'm still considering it, so don't tempt me." Six called over their com.

"Spartans, this is Lieutenant Haverson." A new voice added to the conversation. "I'm aboard the Pelican. Do any of you have a plan? Because at the moment all we have are an objective, three ships and a Covenant Fleet breathing down our necks."

"Haverson, this is The Master Chief. Make a slingshot orbit around the smaller body, Basis. We'll make a short dock and transfer you over. I have a plan."

"Alright chief. We'll come over."

"That goes for you as well, Wilson."

"Negative, chief." Wilson said. "This is my second time flying a spirit, and I haven't seen anything resembling a topside hatch. The only way in and out is through those Prongs, and none of us have Vacuum-tight suits."

The Chief nodded. "Then just follow us along that orbit. Cortana, can you access the Spirit's systems from here?"

"Yes. Wilson, you can let go now. _I'm_ flying now.

"Roger Cortana. And you might not see it, but two marines here are silently cheering that I ain't flying anymore. The third's talking to you right now."

"Nice to see you've got haters behind you. Keep listening in, and we'll keep you informed."

"Wilco. Wilson going silent, for once. I have some Chips to crush."

Fol unstrapped himself, and he headed towards the hatch after Cortana confirmed they were docked. He opened it after he heard a clang. Fol held out a hand, and a hand took it. A man with no hair took it, and Fol lifted him inside with one hand. The ODST looked around, saw both the elite and the Spartans, he seemed to tense up. Fol looked closer at his armor, and saw it was in fact that of ODST's.

 _A coffin soldier. Great._

Another man climbed in, and Fol saw he had close-cropped, vaguely red hair. He had a pyramid-like symbol with a small circle at it's center. _Office of Naval Intelligence then. He will talk to me a lot_. The man looked around, and after seeing the spartans preparing for battle, nodded in approval. He held out a hand near the hatch. A hand grabbed his, and Haverson lifted him in

The last one to enter was, on closer inspection, a female. She had the clothes of a pilot, and Fol nodded to her. She tensed as she saw him, but didn't do anything otherwise. They all gathered in the cockpit.

"Well." the ONI agent said. "I guess you guys weren't kidding when you said you had an Elite with you."

"Yep." the sergeant said, and looked at Fol. "And it's legit, too. He saved both my own ass and those of the others multiple times when he could have just let us die. He even risked his own life for it multiple times."

The coffin soldier turned to Fol, and took on a scowl. "At least tell me you don't want me to trust that thing."

"No, you don't." Fol said, and the Coffin soldier slightly jumped back in surprise. He likely didn't expect Fol to even understand him, much less speak the same language. "Not yet, anyway. I would like, however, that you at least call me a him, or he."

The Coffin soldier, though he still looked pissed, nodded. He then turned to the others. "So what's the story?" he asked. "We got something to shoot here?"

"No." someone on the Com said. Fol recognized him as the coffin soldier he had fought alongside in the Library. "Notice the gravity? We're in a slingshot orbit. We're coming around the moon for another run at the Covenant."

"But shouldn't we escape first?" The ONI agent asked. "We have valuable intel on the Covenant, on Halo and on the Flood. Our first priority should be to reach UNSC-controlled space."

"That's our intention as well." Six said from the pilot's chair. "But last time I checked under the hood, none of our dropships and Fighter have a Slipspace-Drive installed. It will take us years to reach said space without one."

the ONI agent sighed. "Yes, that does limit our options."

Then the chief did something Fol didn't expect. He took command over the ONI agent. "Pardon me, Sir, but I must point out that while you are the ranking officer, Me and my team are on a highly classified mission of the Highest priority. My orders come directly from High Command."

"Meaning?" The ONI agent asked.

"Meaning," Sam said. "The Chief has tactical command of these ships, all of the men... and you, Sir."

Fol looked between the two, and it took only a small second to figure it out. The Spartans had originally been gathered to do a special mission. But it had been interrupted by the Covenant's attack on Reach. It had obviously been important enough to gather as many spartans as possible, or Six wouldn't have been on board. Remembering Cortana's comment about how handy it was that he revealed information about Truth, and combining that with the fact this mission had Spartans from both generations, it could only mean one thing...

 _they were originally going after the Prophets._

Fol was glad he had refused the position among the Prophet's honor guard as long as he had.

"Of course" The agent said. "I am well aware of your mission. I'll do anything I can to assist."

"So, what's the plan? Slingshot orbit- then what? Are we just gonna talk all day?"

"No." The Chief replied. "Get into the pelican, Locklear. We'll only have a few minutes while we're on the other side of the moon, so grab anything we can use: Weapons, ammunition, grenades. Keep lined up to my com, so you can hear the briefing." Locklear took on a bemused look, displeased with the job he had been given.

"If it will motivate you, soldier," Fol said. "think of the chore as getting more guns here to shoot me with."

At this, Locklear's face lit up, and he moved into the dropship, eagerly setting on with that prospect in mind.

"So how do we get a Shaw-Fujikawa drive?" the pilot asked.

"We don't." Linda said. "You think our tall ugly friend here was having that discussion on an open channel just to piss with them? It actually is our best bet to take one of their ships and fly out of here."

Fol nodded. "I came here on the capital ship, so I know at least a large bit of the layout. There's a corridor that leads directly between the bridge and the hanger, with no corners or anything to worry about. A 'walk in the park' as your people often say."

"How about the crew?" another voice over the Com asked. It was the only voice Fol hadn't heard. It was quite a heavy voice, one Fol often placed with combat instructors. "Won't they pose a threat? There ought to be at least a hundred elites on one of those cruisers alone."

"Normally, yes." Fol said. "But we arrived at Halo with a minor prophet, and he... mismanaged the situation on Halo from the start. He redeployed forces all across the ring, leaving only those essential to running the ships behind. At most only a hundred elites are still aboard."

" _Only_ a hundred?" the man asked.

"it wouldn't be fare for them unless they outnumbered us, wouldn't it?"

at this, the Coffin-soldier in the same ship as the last voice laughed. "I like you, you crazy split-jaw. I'll follow you guys in with this dropship, with only a few dozen meters to spare. Should be a cake-walk if Cortana lends a hand."

The Chief nodded. "She will." he turned to her. "But I also want you to infiltrate the Flagship's systems. Shut down their hanger shields long enough for us to enter the ship."

"Sending an unescorted lady in to do your dirty work?" Cortana asked. "Well, I suppose I'm the only one who actually _can_ do that."

"Don't worry, blue princess." Six said jestingly. "You'll get a prince charming someday."

"And when do you get one, Six?" Cortana asked back in the same tone.

"When I sit on the throne of hell, eating pizza with one hand while killing stuff with the other."

"Well, bad luck for you. Hell doesn't take your kind in anymore."

"Shit."

the others looked at both of them. The Chief sighed for a moment before continuing. "Haverson, get the Moray mine systems further back in the Longsword moved to the Pelican. We're gonna use it as a fireship so we don't get blasted away _immediately_ after we leave the moon's orbit." the man nodded. The pilot took on a frown.

"Is there a problem, warrant officer?" Linda asked.

"No, ma'am. I just hate to lose a good ship. That bird got us off Halo in one piece."

"Noted." Sam said. "So, in short, this is the plan: we send out the pelican ahead of us, letting it draw away fire and send a few mines to distract any pursuing forces. We, meanwhile sneak in right after it, land in the hanger, take over the bridge, and enjoy our new model of Slipspace-capable Carrier."

"Rock 'n' Roll!" Locklear called over their com. After a moment he climbed back up the hatch, with a duffel bag over his shoulder.

"Anyone have anything to add?" Johnson asked. "Because I want to get moving to kick some ass out there. No? Then start cracking."

* * *

Six dodged and weaved as they flew through the overlapping fields of fire of the Cruisers.

The Covenant had been waiting for them as they'd crossed from the other side of the moon back towards the debris field. They hadn't accounted for the fact the pelican would be flying straight towards them, so their field of fire was less than optimal. They could, however, fire as many plasma-torpedoes as they liked towards them. And they eagerly did so.

The Pelican was obviously taking the most hits, and Six knew it wouldn't make it to the Hanger. But it didn't need to, and Six was happily flying through the fields of fire. With Wilson's music blasting away in the background.

They had first played Johnson's Flip music as they flew through it. But Locklear, backed by Sam, had him shut it back down. And Six, just to annoy them, had asked Wilson to play _his_ music instead.

And Six found a new thing to enjoy in her life: Epic music.

Most of the others didn't agree with her, but they did agree it was better than Johnson's loud Flip music. Much to Johnson's chagrin.

"Wilson. You keeping up back there?" Six called. "Because I still want a full copy of that music list you've got in there."

"Keeping up just fine. I will admit, though, Polaski would likely have done a better job of it."

"Well, hang on tight. We're finally coming up on the Hanger. Cortana, would you kindly open the door for us?"

"Only because unlike the Chief here, you ask nicely." Cortana said. Indeed, the Hanger shields lowered, and Six started to decelerate a bit. Not much, just so they weren't all juice when they finally stopped.

Then Six fired a single missile ahead of her into the hanger, to clear it up a bit for parking space. The missile apparently hit a plasma tank, for the explosion was quite large. It wasn't long, though, before the cloud of vapor cleared due to the pull of vacuum. And when it cleared, there was a lot more space for them to park.

Six then let go of the controls, and let the ship land by itself.

They hit the deck, and skidded for a few moments, shredding grunts as they went. The Longsword finally stopped against the wall, and it slammed most of the people into the systems-ops seat and pilot seat.

The survivors were all approaching with charged weapons, so Six prepared a treat for them.

The lowered the landing skids so they stood properly, and lowered the Longsword's chainguns.

"We've landed." Six said. "Oooh, a full welcoming committee! Is it my birthday?"

"Spare the Huragok." Fol said as he got up from the floor. "They're non-combatants, and have valuable information f the Covenant inside them. They're more useful alive than dead."

"Spoilsport." Six retorted, but instead of just randomly shooting around took careful aim, and only fired on the grunts. It took a little bit longer to clear them all due to her having to fire around the engineers, but they all were killed within a quarter minute. It took that long for the others to recover from their landing anyway.

After they all were dead, Six activated the intercom on her longsword, and reopened her com to the Spirit. "Thank you for flying with Helljumper airlines. Hope you have had a good flight, and I hope I find a new craft so you guys can fly with me again. Have a good day."

"Well." Wilson said. "You lost your good-driver discount. But at least we're all aboard. Now the fun part begins."

Six nodded, and lowered the ramp. The Spartans all got out first, and looked around the hanger. It was clear aside from the Huragok.

"Don't open fire on the floating squids." the chief called over the com. "They're no threat."

"Awww" Six heard Locklear say.

Six then got an idea. It was odd, and likely wouldn't work. But she did it anyway.

She approached one. It cowered for a moment, but seemed to have a more curious streak. It approached her, and she activated her helmet's translation software. A set of holographic tentacles appeared from her tacpad on her right wrist, and she talked, hoping the translation software was accurate enough.

"What is your name? What was your task?" she asked.

 _I am Tends to Rise_. It signed back, and the text appeared on her HUD. _I was here to maintain fighter craft_.

"What is the current composition of the crew, minus the grunts killed here?"

 _It is currently at 5028 Huragok, 42 Unggoy, 93 Elites and 12 Kig-Yar._

"Alright. Can you repair our ship for us, and keep the elites out for as long as you can?"

 _Will you destroy any more Forerunner sites?_ it asked her.

Six thought about that. _They had a sensitive streak about Forerunner artifacts? They must have been assigned to guard them by the Forerunners. Curious._

"No, only if the Flood contaminate them. And it seems the Flood has been taken care of, no?"

 _Good._ it signed. It seemed to sag a bit in relief. _Good._

Six started to return to the rest to the group, who were helping Wilson and the others out of the Spirit. The Huragok followed her, though, and Six turned back to it. "Is there something else you want to know?"

 _Can I accompany you? You are a reclaimer._

Six was slightly taken aback. These things knew they were Reclaimers? Then why were they following the Covenant? "Sure. Just take cover behind me if there is a firefight, and help us get to the bridge."

 _Thank you. I am linked to the Covenant Battlenet, and a lot of chatter is coming from further down that hallway. It comes from the bridge area, and is headed this way. They are aware of your presence, so expect resistance._

Six immediately turned to the door, and raised her rifle. The others, seeing her do so, raised theirs as well, and Linda turned towards her. "What is it?"

"Covvies coming down the hallway. The Huragok can intercept coms on their Battlenet. It's willing to work with us for as long as we spare it and don't destroy any Forerunner artifacts."

Linda nodded, and took aim from behind a large crate. The others took similar positions. Six headed for an alcove when the Huragok tapped her shoulder.

 _There's a passage-way over there, built mostly for my kind. It can be used to ambush the elites coming down the hallway._

Six nodded, and called Wilson, Stacker and John over. She relayed them what the Huragok told them. John turned to it. "Can you understand me?" he asked.

 _You don't need the holographic tentacles. I understand basic well enough, even if I can't resonate the proper sounds._ Six shut down the tacpad, and then turned to it. "And Basic's your word for English, right?"

 _Yes. It was the basic commerce language during the golden age of the Forerunners._ Six wanted to ask more, but it drifted to a wall, with the outline of a hatch. Six and the others followed it.

It led them down to the hatch, and opened it. It was narrow, and elites wouldn't be able to pass through it, but the Spartans just might.

 _Head forward thirty meters, then go left. You will near a hatch. Stay away from it for 2 meters, as the motion sensor triggers it if you approach closer. I will give you a signal over your com when they've all passed._

Six nodded, and John told his plan to the others. "Alright. On my signal, Haverson opens that door, and you all open fire on the elites. You'll know our signal when you see it."

"Roger." Haverson called.

"Now I'm _really_ gonna rack up the kills." Locklear called.

"Not if I get them first." Johnson called from the other side of the crossfire they'd set up."

"You're all arrogant fools. You _really_ think you'll get any kills before I neutralize them all?" Fol asked.

"Now who's arrogant?" Sam called. "One with the most kills gets the right to be the captain of the _Ascendant Justice_."

"It's a deal." Dubbo called. The others called over their own version of affirmatives.

Six crawled into the Huragok passage-way. It was too tight to traverse it with her shields on, so she temporarily shut them down. After thirty meters, she turned left. Indeed, there was a hatchway that likely led into the main corridor. Six waited just outside of the two meter radius. She turned onto her back, to look at Tends to Rise, who had followed them. "Rise, what prevents the Elites from accidentally triggering the motion-sensors?"

 _The Motion-Sensors are only internal. The Outer side of the hatches can only be opened by a Huragok touch._

"Good to know." Six said. She again turned onto her stomach, and waited. After about a minute, she heard a stampede running past them.

A light chime sounded. Six assumed it was their signal, so she crawled to the hatch. It opened, and she crawled out of it as fast as she could.

They were indeed in a perfect position to ambush the Elites, who numbered into about a dozen. They all had their backs turned to them, and Six took up a firing position as she made room for the others. Wilson crouched out first, followed by Stacker. John came out next, and Rise made up the rear, and he closed the hatch.

Then a weird glow came over all of them. It didn't shine bright enough to encompass the elites, but Six knew that they couldn't sneak up on them now. She turned to Rise. "Rise, did you do this?"

Yes. They add strength to your own shields, and give the ones with lesser armor some minor protection.

"Well, it'l have to do." John said. He then primed a grenade, and threw it at the elites, and Six and Wilson threw theirs as well.

They landed in the center of the group of elites, and three elites died, with two more being seriously injured. All had their shields downed.

The survivors all turned to them. But they didn't expect the door to the hanger now opened, with the humans and elite already in there now having a bottleneck to fire in. Linda hit the two wounded with one shot, which ricocheted into a third. All three of them died. Sam fired his minigun into the hallway, and fired on the large mass of elites. Fol then was visible from the Hanger, and most of them looked with jaws half hanging. Six scowled.

Fol had ripped a plasma turret from it's stance, and was using it like Sam, mowing down the elites with the mere volume of their weapons-fire. Only three were out of their firing range, but Six stabbed one with her knife, John hit the second on the head with the butt of his rifle, and the third...

Six had to look twice, and still didn't believe it. Wilson was on top of the third, which was was attempting to kick him off. Richie was just hitting it around the neck and head with the knuckle-dusters he always seemed to have on his fists. And the Elite seemed to _actually_ be hurt with each punch. Was he also one of the Orion project survivors? It would certainly explain his strength and tenacity.

The elite seemed to be stunned, and Wilson unhooked one of the chains hanging on the right side of his armored trousers. He then wrapped it around the Elite's throat, and pulled, choking it. It died, it's throat already weakened by Wilson's punches. Wilson loosened the chain, wiped it clean on the corpse, and reattached it to his armor. He saw the others were looking at him.

"Now you know that if it weren't for the UNSC, I'd likely be either dead, a gang member or in prison."

after a short silence, Six said "I know the feeling. But with me it'd be the psychiatric ward for the criminally insane."

Wilson laughed, and Johnson, who caught the conversation, walked over to stand next to him.

"Welcome to the club, Wilson." Johnson said. "Welcome to the club of bad-assery."

Fol approached them, and saw Rise fully emerge from a crate in the hallway. He approached him, and Rise started to slowly back away from him. Fol stopped, and dropped the weapon he was holding. Six held out her hand to Rise. "It's okay. This one is with us. He has helped us on Halo, and actually was the one who told us to not shoot any of you. He can be... believed, for the moment."

Fol gave Six a look that Six interpreted as a Do-you-really-want-to-start-this-again-look. Rise, satisfied Six held her fire near him, finally approached Fol. Fol held out his hand, and after a moment Rise lay a tentacle on top of it.

"I know my kind hasn't been good towards yours." Fol started. "But I have learned something that would upset the entire Covenant. It could ensure that you and your companions, partners, whatever you call your fellow Huragok, could actually receive better care. I promise you, the Humans will have you and your companions, if no one else. But please. Set aside your distrust, and help me help the reclaimers."

Rise seemed to ponder it, and then he seemed to drift off. Fol looked away, and Six thought Fol had failed. But then Rise returned, with a cable that led into the wall. He attached it to the plasma cannon, and Six saw one of the meters of the cannon go up, until it reached the end of the metal. He then returned the cable to the wall, and turned to the Chief.

 _I trust you all. I don't see why, but I trust you. Your AI can be inserted in a panel a little bit up ahead. I have recorded a lot of things while in service on this vessel, including navigational and firing calculations. I will aid her in her effort._

John nodded, and moved to where Rise indicated. Indeed, after a few moments, Six saw a slot where Cortana's chip could be inserted into the systems. John inserted her chip, and withdrew it after a moment. Six swore she could see him shiver for a slight moment.

"I'm in." Cortana said. "Withdrawing atmosphere from all sections of the ship except where we are or Huragok without protective gear are present. The bridge is about a hundred meters ahead. The crew there have shut down all systems, effectively forming a Faraday-Cage. I can't see into it."

 _I have no contact anymore with that section of the Battlenet either. But, accounting for all the other members of the crew, I can conclude there are ten elites on the bridge, including the Fleetmaster and the remains of the special-operations brigade._ Rise added.

"Is there any way to regain control of the systems there from here?" Haverson asked.

"No." Cortana answered. "The only way I can gain control of the bridge is if the Chief manually reactivates the bridge systems."

"Well, I suggest we get moving then." Sam said, hefting his Mini-gun up a bit.

Six nodded, and she took the lead in moving on to the bridge. She arrived, and tried to pry the double doors open. They didn't budge.

"Allow me." Sam said from behind her. Six nodded, and stepped back. Sam threw a plasma-grenade at the doors, and then deployed a Covenant-built deployable cover, which consisted of a small shield-generator that formed an impenetrable bubble around it. It absorbed the blast of the grenade, and none of the others were harmed by the explosion. Sam then stepped forward, and pulled again.

This time the doors _did_ open slightly, their systems short-circuited by the EMP always emitted by such grenades. But the doors went open too slowly due to the magnetic locks. Sam, after taking too long to open it, instead gave a kick at the door, and the structure in the lock in the middle visibly bent away. Sam then pulled at one of the door, and it actually collapsed towards them onto the floor. He then pushed the other door back into it's housing as far as it could. He then nodded to the others, and they all stepped in.

To find about ten elites all aiming weapons towards them.

* * *

Fol entered the bridge alongside the rest of the group, and he looked at the crew of the bridge. And they didn't seem to like him being here.

He and the others entered the bridge after the Spartan rudely smashed it, taking one of the hatches off it's hinges with his amplified strength, and had then entered the bridge, and Fol followed. To find ten elites aiming assorted weapons at them.

Most wielded Plasma Rifles and Needlers, but here and there a Spec-ops Elite had brandished an Energy Sword, and Fol could spot one Carbine resting on a crate that was used as cover.

But the worst part to this, at least to Fol's opinion, was the composition of the crew.

N'tho Sroam and Usze 'Taham, The Sangheili that had joined him on his assault on the Bridge of the human vessel, were there, each brandishing a sword. They both looked at him, the hurt of his betrayal in their eyes. They both flanked the Fleetmaster, Thel Vadam, who stood on the central platform. Thel had two Energy Swords out, and had his eyes locked on Fol.

"I will hand this to you" Thel said. "You are as stubborn as you are treacherous."

"And you, despite your earlier show pragmatism, are still as misguided as the rest of our race." Fol retorted." This drew a snarl from Thel, but Fol continued on none the less. The humans were all slowly spreading themselves across the room, so they wouldn't be caught all huddled up once the fighting started.

"Do you really think I would be persuaded to join their cause by mere promises of riches and glory? By assurances of survival at the end of the war? I'm not as cowardly or as dishonorable as to do that. You know this to be true."

Thel, despite his anger and contempt still showing, nodded. "Ah, yes. The self-righteousness of the Sang'Katarn warriors. I've heard all about it. And what persuaded you that joining the 'Nishum was the right thing to do?"

Fol looked at the chief, asking for permission to reveal it. He nodded, though he seemed to hesitate for a second. Fol looked back at Thel. "The word of the Monitor of the Halo-ring."

At this, multiple of the elites reared back in shock. Some even lowered their weapons slightly. Thel, however, seemed skeptical. "And do you have actual proof of this? Where is the Oracle, then? Would he not be here to help the Humans?"

Before he could respond, Thel looked at the rest of the crew. "This heretic has betrayed us, and is trying to persuade you to join his cause. Kill them, and we will be rewarded by the Prophets."

Most of the Elites nodded, reassured for the moment. One even called "For the Great Journey!" in order to rally the others. And then they opened fire.

Fol, giving up on his hopes to persuade the Fleetmaster, opened fire as well. He sprayed his Plasma Cannon at the Fleetmaster and the Spec-ops soldiers, but they dived out of the way, in different directions. Thel ran straight at Fol, and Fol dropped the Plasma Cannon to grab his swords. He met the Fleetmaster halfway in his sprint. They clashed blades, and locked them together for a moment.

"How far you have fallen, Field-Marshal. I shall flay your skin, and present the Hierarchs the one to blame for Halo's destruction. Who would _then_ be the Arbiter, Katarn'ee?" Thel goaded.

"It's the Covenant that has fallen, Thel. They had the moment the San'Shyuum had declared war on Humanity. You are merely too misguided to see the truth." Fol retorted.

Fol then shut one of his blades down to free it from the lock, reactivated it, and tried to stab at Thel's sword hand, the one that was still locked into blocking Fol's other blade. Thel imitated Fol's trick, deactivated said sword, and jumped away. Fol jumped straight after him, intent on taking down Thel. If he died or was incapacitated, the other Elites in the room would falter.

Thel once again met his blades. He made cross-attack, striking at his feet with one blade while swiping at Fol's head vertically with the other at the same time. Fol jumped out of the way, and gave a kick to Thel's right leg. Thel blocked it with his arm, and once again tried to swipe at Fol's head. Fol blocked it.

It went that way for the majority of the duel, with both attempting to find an opening in the other's defenses while blocking attacks from the other. But then others changed the game.

'Taham and Sroam joined the duel, and Fol was outnumbered three-to-one. Fol could hold his own against them, but he was steadily losing ground to their simultaneous attacks. Fol didn't get the chance to attack, for every time one of them started to show a weakness in technique, or a lapse in their defenses, one of the others was always there to catch the blow for them, and continued the offensive with the others.

Fol gave a quick glance to the others. The Marines and ODST soldiers were engaging three elites that were near the other entrance to the Bridge. It lead to escape-pods, so Fol presumed they were covering Thel's means of escape if things went wrong. The Spartans were each taking on one of the remaining elites in close-quarter combat, each trading blows and kicks. They were all busy. The ONI agent and the pilot were at the edge of the battlefield, trying to take aim at various targets at a distance. Fol could maneuver the trio assaulting him so the humans could fire on them, but they would be promptly cut down. And that was not an option. So there was no one to aid him at the moment.

Then, after half a second of looking, he turned back to the fight, in time for him to block a swipe from 'Taham. He then made a faint at 'Sroam, but turned it into a full barrage of strikes at Thel. He swiped at him with speed and precision. Similarly, he noted, to how the Spartan known as Six had engaged him near the Onager cannon on Reach. But then he made a mistake.

In the middle of a strike at Thel, he accidentally opened his back to 'Taham. And he wasn't one to waste such an opportunity.

Fol barely made a roll away from the three in time, but then he accidentally fell into one of the trenches that lined the platform. The three jumped in after him, and had him cornered.

Fol looked around at the three, and saw nothing that would help him. Nothing but consoles and seats for the crew that usually occupied them.

 _The consoles..._

Fol made a strike at one of the elites, and all three blocked, and pressed Fol closer to the wall. And ended up standing right next to the sensor's console.

Fol then threw a frag grenade at it, and jumped up out of the trench, kicking himself up from one of the seats as the other elites that attacked him tried to get out of range of the explosion. And they each went in a different direction. Fol had now two options: He could stand still for a moment and catch his breath, or he could press the advantage he now had, and hope to take down one of the elites before the others were on him again.

He jumped at Sroam, hoping to take him down as he jumped out of the trench.

But Thel then jumped at him, and kicked him in the stomach in midair. The blow got through his shields, and still hit him with enough force that Fol doubled over slightly from the pain as he landed. Thel attempted to strike at him while he was laying on the floor, and Fol barely blocked each blow Thel made. But each blow brought his defenses closer to his body, and it was inevitable one of the blows would hit against his sword, and make him cut himself in the process. And then he was done for. His other sword had been thrown out of his hand when he had been kicked, so Fol had to use his one sword against two of Thel's.

Then Thel made a swipe at the side, and Fol's remaining blade was slashed against his hand.

Thel held one blade against Fol's throat, and the other up above his head, ready to decapitate him. "Any last words before you die, traitor?" Thel asked, his victory assured.

Fol looked with his only remaining eye in both of Thel's and spoke. "Only that I pity you, for your dogmatic faith in Truth."

Thel glared for a moment, before bringing his right blade down for the killing blow.

There was a flash.

* * *

The first thing Kelly noticed as they fled the area was that the Covenant seemed to have... misjudged the way they were going to take the planet

The Covenant had attacked the planet in multiple stages, starting first with a small scouting force and a few Corvettes, and gradually ramping up the amount of troops. A UNSC scout team had discovered an invading army in the Viery territory, and later had a single Super-Carrier assault the planet below. Not that Super-Carriers, with their 28 kilometers from bow to stern, were something to be messed with, but usually the Covenant sent entire fleets of ships to destroy a single human world.

And such a fleet had only arrived after said Super-Carrier had been destroyed. That fleet, which had consisted of about 300 ships, had devastated the planet, glassing cities along their way, and glassing every major population center.

But the Glassing had stopped just as it was about to pass over their area. They were flying away in stolen banshees after the ground-side generators had been overrun by Covenant forces. They had been overrun around the same time she, Fred and Josh had been destroying a Covenant cruiser in a adjacent canyon. She and Fred had been lucky to survive both the Cruiser's barrage _and_ the assault on the generators. Many, like Joshua, hadn't. To make matters even weirder, the Covenant had deployed their forces around Menachite mountain.

Now she and Fred were on their way to the Fallback position, CASTLE base, which was also lodged inside Menachite mountain. They had picked up from stray transmissions that the Pillar of Autumn had escaped orbit about fifteen minutes ago, and that four spartans had been aboard, and Kelly hoped James, Linda, Sam and the Spartans he picked up were aboard.

Along with John.

Kelly hoped he was alive. It gave Humanity a chance for survival. It would assure her that everyone else was alive, and that they would live to fight another day.

And, despite not admitting it to herself, she loved him.

Kelly mentally kicked herself for this for only truly realizing it upon her likely death, but she couldn't deny the damn feelings any longer.

So she merely hoped, recognizing that event were out of her hands at the moment.

They were coming up at CASTLE base. They just had fly a few more ki-

and then her Visor shorted out for a few minutes, and her shields went down, only to slowly recharge slowly thereafter. Her banshee started to drop. It still went forward, but it was more gliding and momentum than actual flying.

"EMP!" she shouted to Fred over their com. "Or some plasma effect."

"Hard landing!" Fred immediately ordered.

She grunted. It wasn't a very good thing, landing hard on the ground on a banshee. And on her way to flee the coming explosion of the cruiser, she had been hit by some shrapnel in her shoulder.

This was gonna hurt.

"Heads up! Covenant Hunters dead ahead." Fred yelled.

Kelly looked at where Fred was flying for, and saw what he meant. Two Hunters had hidden among the rocks, and they were now charging their guns, aiming at Fred. Fred's Banshee dropped at the last second, evading the shots fired. But his Banshee hit the ground, and in it's tumble, though it hit one of the Hunters, knocked Fred to the ground. The Hunter then shrugged off the wreckage, and aimed his gun at Fred.

Kelly thought for a quick second, which was for her, due to the Augmentations enhancing all her speeds (Including the speed at which she thought, if she did so quick enough), nearly a full minute. Like an AI, Kelly noted. She had two options. She could fire on the hunter, distract it from Fred, and be shot down by the creatures soon after.

Or she could do the suicidal thing, the thing John would likely do as well. She opened her com, and yelled a single word. "Duck!"

Kelly pushed the throttle of her Banshee to full, and then jumped out, letting the aircraft crash into the hunter targeting Fred. It hit, and showered the thing with metal fragments. The Hunter started to run around in confused circles. Kelly saw a few orange smears on the ground.

She landed right next to Fred, grabbed a Plasma grenade captured earlier, and threw it at the gun of the other Hunter. It lodged in the barrel, and exploded. The gun crackled and slowly melted from the heat.

"Run!" Fred yelled, as he got to his feet. Not that she needed to be told twice. Kelly sprinted between the remaining trees of the forest, hoping to put some distance between the hunters and herself. Kelly headed for the fallback point, knowing that the Covenant had surrounded the mountain. She opened her Com to Fred. "Didn't you see while we were airborne?" Concern started to tighten her voice. "There's about half the entire Covenant assault force just ahead."

"Ground troops? How far?"

"About half a click."

Fred was silent for a moment, likely assessing the situation. "Something's not right. Let's see what they're up to."

Kelly winked her acknowledgement light red. "They're between us and the fallback point." Fred retorted as she did so. "We have to."

Kelly shut off her com for a second, and let out a lot of curses and expletives she had overheard Mendez say once. She looked around to see if the hunters were pursuing. They were, but they were going way too slow. Satisfied that they still had some time, she headed forward again.

Then her Com crackled. "- is Gamma team, Alpha. Come in."

"Gamma, this is Alpha. Go ahead." Fred said.

Kelly couldn't hear much, for there was a lot of static. "Whitcomb... too many. Got- picked up- Do you read?"

"Gamma. The Fallback is hot. Repeat hot! Acknowledge." Fred was practically shouting over the com. But only static responded to him.

"I hope they heard." Fred said to Kelly.

"Red-21 can take care of his team. Don't worry." Kelly told him. "Take a look at this."

she moved forward, and Fred followed. Kelly whistled, satisfied with what she saw. They were seemingly coming up on a Covenant parking lot, for a lot of vehicles were lined up in even rows and columns. Ghosts, Revenants, Specters, Wraiths, Banshees...

and one Type-47A 'Protos' model Scarab tank. These were very powerful, but rarely deployed on ops like this.

"I can't think of a better disguise" she whispered. "than 20 tons of Covenant armor." she started forward, but Fred grabbed her arm, pulling her back. "you sound a lot like Sam when you say things like that. But let's think things through first. There are two possibilities. First, If the Covenant have found our fallback position, we go in guns blazing and carve a way for Delta team to get out."

That made sense. She nodded. "And the other possibility?"

"They don't know that Delta is holed up under the mountain. Then..." Fred hesitated, and Kelly knew what came next. "Then we have to draw them away." Kelly finished before he could. "I was afraid you were going to say that." She gave a heap of dirt a little kick. "But you're right."

then a blip appeared on her motion tracker, headed straight for her. The hunter must have followed them. "Move." Fred whispered.

They crossed the field quickly, and the grunts guarding the vehicles never saw them. Kelly grabbed a good hold of one of the legs, and climbed up until she was on the lower platform that infantry used to repel boarders from the massive tank. She held out a hand for Fred, and after a moment they were both on the large tank. They moved into the interior of the large tank. Kelly noticed that there were a lot of Covenant storage crates inside. There were only two elites inside, with their backs turned to them. Kelly and Fred crept up on them, and Kelly jumped up, kicked at the head of one to topple it, and as she landed, jumped again, this time landing in a crouch on the thing's head. Fred had grabbed both his knives, and used them to both slit it's neck and stab it in the eye. They both knew from experience that a major blood vessel for the brain lay behind it, and it bled to death.

Fred moved to the main console, and started the thing up. Kelly moved to the exit back outside. She hit one of the holographic controls, and a shield appeared, separating them from the outside.

They were now locked in the biggest killing machine in a kilometers. But the Wraiths are definitely a concern.

"You know, If we use the main gun to take out the vehicles here, it's impossible to hide us as the perpetrators. But they can use them against us if we just leave them here."

"I know." Fred said. "So we compromise. I'll move us a bit away, and you take them out with the topside guns."

"Do they angle down far enough for that?"

"One way to find out."

Fred then pressed a few buttons, and they started to move from the main hub of vehicles. Kelly moved to the other console, and hit a few controls to experiment with the controls. They somehow seemed... familiar. Like she had used them her whole life.

"Red-One" Kelly said over the com. "Ready when you are."

"Ready here. Take out the motor pool."

"Affirmative." Kelly said, keeping both the anticipation and glee from her voice. Kelly hit the central hologram, and the guns that were aimed at the motor pool. The shots fired, and after a few seconds the motor pool was an inferno. Fred moved them away from the motor pool.

The Covenant were approaching en masse towards them, but ended up passing them as they were headed for the large plasma fire. Fred steered the monstrosity they controlled towards the Fallback point.

"They think we're on their side." Fred said to her. "They're going to see what attacked them. Let's not show ourselves until we have to."

"Agreed."

They were approaching the entrance. The Covenant had definitely set up camp here, for the hexagonal structures of Elite tents were set up in an area half a kilometer from the entrance. There were shade turrets spread around them to protect them as well. Both the newer orange bubble like versions and the older, purple large-barrel versions.

Kelly magnified one of her displays, and the Front turret zoomed in on one specific area. There were more scarabs set up there as well, seemingly there to dig into the mountain.

"They've found the Caverns." Kelly reported to him. "Looks like they were going to dig them out."

Kelly was puzzled, though, by the fact they were going through all this trouble just to get at Delta team. They had the firepower to just blast down the mountain from orbit. _Why_?

Or maybe they weren't after Delta-team at all.

She snapped out of her thoughts as Fred keyed his com. "Delta, if you're listening in, we're coming in from south-southeast in a captured Covenant Scarab, 'Protos' type. You'll know which one from Red-two's fireworks. Keep your heads down, and don't waste any ammo on us."

He keyed over to Kelly's personal coms. "Blaze a trail, Red-Two! Take out anything that moves between us and the entrance, and exit this thing as soon as the distance is less than fifty meters! Then head for the entrance ASAP!"

"I'm on it!" she called out, and then she concentrated on clearing the airspace in front of her. Then another acknowledgement light went on. It was Isaac's.

 _So at least some made it to the CASTLE. Good._

Kelly then fired, and a banshee disappeared into smoke. She fired again, and this time a phantom went down, smoke trailing from it's passenger bay.

But they just kept coming.

Then they reached the fifty meter mark, so Kelly set the systems on auto-control, and ran for the exit, and pressed the hologram that released the shields. She ran through as soon as they lowered, and jumped out. She ran for the entrance, and was pleased to see Will, Spartan-043, providing them covering fire from a Warthog turret. She sprinted to cover behind the Warthog he was firing from, and ducked.

And then remembered something, and jumped back out. Fred was still firing away with the Scarab's main turret. Banshees were swarming over it, the turrets she had set on auto-firing melted from numerous hits.

"Fred, _you're_ now the one imitating Sam." Kelly yelled. "Banshees are swarming over you. Get out."

after half a minute, Fred finally emerged, and sprinted towards the entrance. And the Scarab started to follow him.

"Set it to auto-follow me, so it collides with the entrance and blocks it. It'll delay them as they attempt to follow us." Fred explained as he finally arrived at the entrance,which led into a cave.

Kelly grabbed a rocket-launcher laying ready, and fired at a Wraith taking aim at the scarab, which was close to colliding with the low-roofed entrance. The tank backed off, and Kelly ran towards the back of the cave.

"Get below!" Will said. "We'll cover you."

Kelly saw a shat that led deeper underground, with a steel cable hanging in the center. She grabbed it, and zipped down the shaft into another cave. She cleared away a bit from the Cable as she landed after a few hundred meters, and heard a few thuds soon after. Will and Fred had arrived.

"This way." Will said, and Kelly and Fred followed him. Will moved with a severe limp, and Kelly remembered the spartans here had been assigned at the fallback positions because of the injuries they sustained after their high-altitude jump. Kelly heard a few loud bangs and explosions coming from the shaft, and after a moment it collapsed entirely, locking them in the caverns.

"Lotus anti-tank mines," Will explained. "combined with excavation charges we found a bit back. ONI seemed to have been busy expanding the base further into the mountain, and we decided to make use of the leftover charges."

"Good." Fred answered. "That'll slow our uninvited guests down."

They rounded the corner, and Kelly's mood lifted slightly. Isaac and Vinh sat on either side of the hallway, behind an obstacle course of barricades they had set up. The deployable covers were set up on the floor, the walls and even the ceiling. But a single area in the middle of the hallway was always clear, so targets further down the hallway could always be fired upon. There was a single, large, round door at the end of the hallway. It seemed a lot like a safe door.

"Where's the rest of the team?" Fred asked. "And the marines from charlie company?"

"They didn't make it." Will replied. "We were separated on the way, and their warthog was later found burning. No bodies, but we found a lot of Covenant tracks." Will paused. "No contact since then."

"Any word on Beta team?" Kelly asked.

"Negative." Will said. "How about Gamma?"

"They're out there." Fred replied. "I heard them on the com, but I couldn't make out much. I warned them away from this position."

"Good."

kelly moved to inspect the door. Will moved over to join her. "Palm and Retinal scanner are broken. There's voice access, which we've tried, but there's no response. This door must be a meter thick, so without cutting tools or a lot more of those excavation-grade explosives, we're stuck on this end."

"You spoke to the people on the other side?" she asked.

"Channel's open, but there's been no reply. Everyone on the other side likely bugged out when the Covenant started moving in on the area."

Kelly looked closer at the vault door. Maybe there was another way. "Or maybe you're just not saying anything they want to hear." Kelly then whistled their all-clear tune: Oly Oly Oxen Free. Will nodded. "I didn't think of that."

kelly moved towards the door. She activated the voice control, and whistled the tone. She turned it off again, and waited. After two minutes, Kelly had enough waiting. The Covenant would be closing in on them, and they were sitting ducks in this hallway.

"It was a good Idea." Fred told her. "We'll recon the shaft's remains. Maybe it's not completely collapsed. Will, you-"

Then a thud sounded behind them, like a heavy bar quickly moving sideways. They all turned, and the Vault door started to open. There was a hiss as the seams parted, and the door swung inwards on balanced, silent hinges.

Two figures, silhouetted by bright light from further down the hallway beyond, stood in the doorway.

Kelly's visor compensated, and she recognized them.

One was definitely a Spartan, though he wasn't a Spartan-II. She knew because he was both a bit smaller than her comrades. Nothing much, barely an inch, but it was enough to set them apart. The second way she knew was because she had never seen him before. He wore green armor, had a scout-helmet with a red visor, and had a Sniper Rifle slung across his back. He had a DMR aimed down the hallway behind them.

The other was a small female human. She had graying hair, and had on a gray pleated skirt and a white coat, with her data-pad in one of her hands. Her glasses reflected the light from the hallway. Kelly knew who it was instantly.

It was Dr. Catherine Elizabeth Halsey, the creator of the Spartan-II program, their Mjolnir armor all of them wore, and the AI, Cortana, that John was now paired with.

"Oly Oly Oxen Free." Halsey said, with a smile on her face. "All out in the free, we're all free."

* * *

The first thing Jun noticed as he opened the door to the tunnels was that Halsey seemed almost... happy. And he hadn't seen the doctor happy before.

After escorting her to CASTLE base, he had helped her initiate Operation: WHITE GLOVE, which was, to put his orders in a more simple term, to make sure no classified data remaining in the base left their hands. He had loaded the Base's AI, Kalmiya, into a data chip, so she could be carried when they needed to leave. But then the Covenant had surrounded the mountain, and their Pelican had been clown up. Jun and Halsey had been scouring through the Base's files in search for a way out, but had found nothing that didn't lead to the Covenant force outside.

And Halsey had run across the Spartan-III files as she'd searched, and asked him endless questions about it.

As far as Jun was aware, she wasn't on the Need-To-Know list for the program, and so he had given her the same story he had told everyone else: He was part of a second class of Spartan-II's, which were trained even after she had been rotated out of the Program.

But Halsey had persisted, and Jun had inadvertently slipped a few small details, like Camp Currahee. She had persisted, and Jun was almost about to give in to her questions.

But then the Spartans had arrived at the rear entrance, and Jun had a moment of reprieve. And he also got to meet a few of Jorge's former teammates.

Halsey had opened the door after one of the Female spartans had given the all-clear signal they had all been taught by Mendez, and Jun and Halsey had opened the gate for them. It was a long procedure, and the Spartans were almost about to leave, when the vault door finally opened.

And Halsey was obviously happy to see the Spartans she had helped train, even if the world was ending right above their heads.

Jun stepped into the tunnel a bit further, and guarded it for them, giving them and the Doctor some privacy. After a minute they all stepped inside, and Jun shut the doors behind them. First he re-shut the vault door, then he re-activated the mine field he had set up in the room beyond. Then he shut the heavy armory-grade doors that the base had installed behind them.

"We have access to Aqua, Scarlet and Lavender Levels." He heard Halsey say as he caught up with the group. "Follow me to the medical wing." she then led them into the concrete hallway that led to the medical-wing. He remembered because he had searched the room for threats, and had gone through this hallway before. "I know the Covenant entered the Epsilon Eridani system at approximately oh-five-hundred hours. ONI Section Three staff evacuated this Facility at oh-fie-thirty hours. I assume you'r not here to let me know it's safe to come out?"

"Yes, Ma'am." One of the Spartans said. Jun saw the number 104 had been added to his chest armor in braille. "I mean, no, Ma'am. It's not safe. The Covenant The Fleet engaged the Covenant in orbit, after the initial army on the Viery territory had been eliminated. But the enemy managed to still deploy some Ground-forces. They attacked us on multiple fronts, attacking the _Pillar of Autumn_ while she was restocking on arms on the surface after returning due to the general recall of all forces, attacking the ground-side generators for the Orbital Defense Platforms at the same time. Most of us were assigned to guard the Generators." The Spartan paused for a moment, and Jun knew what would come next.

"We were not successful in that mission. Covenant forces overwhelmed our position. We fell back here... We thought it would be secure."

"I see." Halsey said. "And what of Captain Keyes? John and Sam?"

"Unknown, Ma'am." the same Spartan replied. He seemed to be the unofficial team leader of this group. "The Master Chief and part of our team attempted to retrieve an unsecured NAV-database from an orbital station before the Covenant got to it. Sam was deployed to escort a previously unknown Spartan team, designate Noble, back to the Autumn. As far as I'm aware, Only he and another Spartan made it."

"Mind if I ask who?" Jun asked, and the others turned to him. He hadn't spoken to them at all, and they likely didn't suspect he would speak at all. It was how all the other soldiers reacted to him. But they were spartans, and the Spartan outranked him at the moment, so Jun afforded him at least some respect.

"I was a part of Noble-team, but I was assigned to escort Doctor Halsey to CASTLE base to ensure nothing would fall into enemy hands." Jun paused, remembering Jorge and Kat. "We haven't had any contact from them since our separation."

The Spartan who had previously spoken nodded. "I didn't catch a name, but I heard she was designated Noble Six from a few sporadic intercepted messages."

So Six was the only other survivor. That Meant Carter and Emile were gone. Jun grimaced, and changed their status on the active duty roster to MIA. He saved the changes and nodded.

"Well," Jun said. "If Six is with them, then they'll both be alright. Six is the Toughest Spartan I've ever seen, even if she's a bit... insane at times. They'll live."

The others nodded, and they continued on. They finally arrived at the medical bay, and Jun prepared some of the equipment Halsey would likely need. He had learned that from Six, who had been their medical expert.

"Doctor Halsey." The same Spartan said. "Permission to speak freely?"

"Granted." The doctor said. "I don't stand on ceremony, particularly given the circumstances. Speak your mind."

"Ma'am, Something isn't normal about this Covenant invasion. They've won, but they aren't completely. As far as I can determine, They've only guessed glassed the poles and some of the lower altitudes."

"And they had Scarabs in position over this facility to dig it out." another of the Spartans added. Jun noted that in braille, the number 087 had been imprinted onto her armor.

"Combining that with the Elite advanced teams that raided Visegrad Relay, that adds to a mystery." Jun complemented to it. "It warrants an investigation later on, even if we are stuck under a large pile of rocks at the moment."

"Indeed." Halsey said. "They've never shown interest in Humans or Human technologies-" But then Halsey arrived at her office, and a hologram appeared in front of it.

It was a human female, with long black hair, and a pair of glasses. She wore a lab-coat over a black shirt, and wore jeans. It was, however, barefoot. Jun recognized her as Kalmiya.

"Doctor, I am detecting that the Spartans are injured. It would be wise if we treated them first, before going on and investigating why the Covenant investigating this anomaly." She said.

"Yes. You're right."

"I have prepared the Spartans' medical files, and sent runners to fetch stocks of blood plasma and other medical supplies from cold storage. Tools for assistance in the removal of their Mjolnir armor are already present."

Kalmiya gestured, and a door on the side of the wing opened. There were assorted cranes and racks on the other side, with new parts among them as well.

Jun knew his armor was slightly obsolete, for he used the armor supplied b the Reach armories instead of the newer tech supplied from Chi Ceti. It wasn't all that worse from the II's Mjolnir Armor, for they had the same basics. But those of Spartan-II's was more streamlined, and could carry more without impeding body movements. He hoped he would get some newer armor parts as well.

"Very good." Doctor Halsey said. "Continue to track seismic activity overhead. Interface with the Spartan's biomonitors and and patch the output to the display on bay three."

Jun moved the Mjolnir parts to one of the tables, and arrayed the parts.

"Jun." Doctor Halsey said, and he turned around. Halsey had just finished with the first Spartan that had spoken, and was busy with another. There were still three others.

"Get to the armory, and pick up the new weapons we got here for Field-testing last week, as well as some new prototype Mark VI parts. We'll swap them out for their damaged components, and give you some _proper_ Mjolnir, not the Reach knock-offs. Fred and William will help you carry it back here."

Jun nodded, and got moving. Halsey finished up with the second spartan, and he and the first followed Jun.

"This way." He said, and the others followed.

* * *

Halsey finished up with Isaac, who had internal contusions and both shoulders dislocated and reinserted incorrectly. It had pinched up the blood vessels. He, along with Vinh, set out to inspect the perimeter Jun had set up. She had confidence Jun could do a proper job, but with the amount of Covenant overhead, at least according to Fred, one couldn't be too careful. Halsey turned her attention to Kelly.

And she was by far off the worst. She had an incredibly low blood pressure, and moderate bleeding in her liver. Christ, her entire right lung had collapsed. It was a miracle she was even alive, much less up and fighting.

But, of course, she had something to fight for, namely the fact that she could live to see Sam and John again.

"Doctor Halsey," Kelly asked. "Where are the others?"

"As I said." Halsey said. "They've evacuated. As I and Jun arrived from an overrun SWORD base, we volunteered to stay behind for Operation: WHITE GLOVE. Lay on the table, please. I'd like to perform some minor repairs."

Kelly complied, and she lay on the table. "In the lower levels of the base, there are a lot of high explosives, and combined with the excavation-grade explosives you undoubtably saw earlier, they will be quite sufficient to level at least the parts of the mountain this base is located in. It'll ensure the Covenant don't get access to our technology."

Halsey removed parts of Kelly's armor, and started treating her, but she already knew Kelly would lose her long. Through the MRI, Halsey could see the tissue slowly turn blue and necrotic brown.

"Her files already are pulled up for Flash-cloning, Doctor." Kalmiya said. Her hologram turned to the Spartan. "You're fine for the moment, Spartan. It's merely we're down here a long time. You've sustained an injury from plasma damage that could be harmful in a few weeks. It would turn into Boren's syndrome if we let it manifest itself for a week."

Halsey nodded in thanks to the AI. Kalmiya had originally been developed to test the infiltration and intrusion subroutines. It had beed debugged, and put into Cortana, and that effectively made Kalmiya Cortana's older sister. Section Three had ordered her to shut Kalmiya down, but Halsey had disobeyed that command for years, for two reasons. One, because she had grown fond of Kalmiya. She was caring and had a sense of humor, she could think on her feet. It reminded Halsey of Cortana, and Halsey intended to give Kalmiya to one of the other Spartans in the near future.

And two: because for some reason, despite being active since May 25 2537, she has never shown any signs of the stages of Rampancy that usually came with a 'Smart' AI. Halsey had been puzzled by it, and had kept her close in order to discover what anomaly had caused it. And Kalmiya had also been upgraded by Halsey, to the point Halsey knew she actually _could_ rival Cortana.

 _That would lead to an interesting encounter if the two of them ever met in person._

"Doctor, there's an anomaly in the Spartan's medical files. I think you want to see this in private." Kalmiya said.

Halsey nodded, and started to move towards her office, but Kelly got up as well. Halsey returned to her side, and pressed her down. "Rest." she told her.

"No, Ma'am. I'm ready to-"

"Down." Halsey said. She pressed Kelly down again, under no illusion she could best the Spartan in strength. But it reinforced her words. "Doctor's orders. If you need me, I'll be in my office over there."

kelly sighed, but she lay down again. Halsey noted that Kelly still kept her eye on Halsey, even while she lay there. Kalmiya's avatar moved with her into Halsey's office, and closed the window's shutters. Not entirely, merely so Kelly couldn't see into the office and see what Kalmiya was doing.

"Here." Kalmiya said, bringing up a specific file from three months ago. It was a data request into the medical files of all Spartan-II's medical files. "That's Araqiel's code. You know that's never particularly good."

"Araqiel's now Ackerson's watchdog, so no surprise there. Trace the request."

"Done."

"That was fast, even for you Kalmiya."

"Oh, I prepared it while you and Jun fetched Red-team from the entrance."

Kalmiya truly is a gem. Halsey would miss having her around. But she would be more usefull deployed alongside a Spartan.

"Oh." Kalmiya said. "It appears Araqiel's here as well. He's even trying to break into the projector's systems right now. Shall I let him, or just purge him from the systems?"

Halsey thought for a moment. If Araqiel was here, then Ackerson obviously was involved in whatever was in those files. Maybe they could even get some answers out of him.

"Let him 'seize' control. Let's see what he has to say."

"Yes, Doctor."

Kalmiya's avatar winked out, and after a moment... _something_ took her place. It was an elongated skull, had horns, fire-filled eyes and jagged teeth. It was Araqiel, the AI Ackerson had as a personal assistant.

"Civilian consultant 409871." It said in a deep rumble. "Doctor Catherine Elizabeth Halsey."

"Araqiel." Halsey said. "Did your master leave you behind when he was reassigned? And don't you have anything better to do than snooping in the Spartan-II files?"

"Ackerson left me here to ensure no unauthorized personnel would access classified information. Which you are doing right now."

"And who's gonna stop me? You?"

"Yes. While you accessed the medical files of your Spartan-II's, I seized access of the air reclamation systems of the medical wing. You know all of the things I can do."

but then Kalmiya actually got herself into the conversation. Her avatar appeared next to Araqiel. "Oh, so that's what those weak intrusion attempts were. I wondered why they were so weak I barely paid attention to them as I stopped them."

"Kalmiya." Araqiel said. "The obsolete kid of the family. I thought Halsey had deleted you along with the other files of WHITE GLOVE."

"Well, I am obsolete enough that I know the line commands that will effectively delete you, you arrogant waste of programming." Kalmiya then added a button of a console to her avatar's appearance, though not on her body. "How about that?"

Araqiel visibly reeled backwards. "You wouldn't dare!" He started. "I contain vital information, and I-"

"While you and Doctor Halsey had that lovely chat, I copied all of your data from your mainframe. I know everything _you_ know. We actually _don't_ need you here."

"No!" Araqiel begged. "Please!"

"Goodbye, Araqiel. Say hi to Ackerson in hell for me."

Kalmiya's avatar pressed the button, and Araqiel's avatar fragmented into a thousand pieces. He couldn't even scream as he was deleted.

Kalmiya grabbed one of the fragments, and swung it across the office like a pebble across a lake. Halsey looked at her. "You know." Halsey said to her. "I'm glad you aren't a human being. Wouldn't want to come across you while you were on PMS."

Kalmiya laughed. "Me neither. I'm still busy sorting through all the files, but five of them stood out. One's titled S-III, which I'll leave in further detail for the end. Another's a reference to a star system, near Zeta Doradus. The third is called King Under The Mountain, detailing more inscriptions on the rock from Cote d'Azur, and some caves underneath this base showing similar symbols. The fourth is titled 'Legionary armada', but it consists of nothing more but suspected covenant fleet movements. The last one is called, and I quote, 'Graves' Vengeance'. It details a previously unknown insurrectionist group. It had surfaced the first time around 2540, but is untraceable. Though unconfirmed, it is suspected to be led by a Marcus Graves."

Halsey's gut knotted. She recalled that name all to well. He was a navy ensign Halsey had recruited as a pilot to pick up the Spartan-II children back in 2517, because of his ability to keep secrets. But she hadn't accounted for his conscious rebelling against her actions. Though he had defected silently, he had made a lot of inquiries about the Spartan-II's the day before he left. If he was now leading an insurrectionist group...

"Kalmiya, save the other Files for later, proper examination, and open the file Graves' Vengeance."

"Is something wrong, doctor?" Kalmiya genuinely seemed worried for Halsey, and was actually frowning at her.

"Graves was a pilot who picked up the Spartan-II recruits. He had quite a conscious, and was particularly interested in the children."

"and you believe he wants to do the same?" Kalmiya asked?

"If anything, he'll come after me in the future for what I did to them. I'm worried he'll come back to haunt me one day." Halsey paused. "What has ONI got on them?"

Kalmiya looked closer at the files. Then she frowned. "Surprisingly, all ONI has on them is that they sent a message to ONI back in 2540, saying that no matter if it was war or not, the Truth would come out. The man speaking it wasn't visible, but they recognized Graves' voice somewhere in the background, even if it wasn't audible what he said. It was sent to Parangosky's directly, and she had Ackerson investigate it further. He found nothing."

Halsey was surprised for sure. She could say a lot, but Ackerson was one of the best digital trackers ONI had at the moment, at least until Cortana and Kalmiya finally emerged. For him to find nothing, Graves' people had to be among the best.

 _Or INSIDE ONI._

"Nothing?" she finally asked.

"The message was sent from a one-time-use satellite deployed on the edge of our territory. It sent the message after a three-week timer had elapsed. There were no fingerprints, no traces of DNA, nothing. The satellite itself was custom-built, with no registered manufacturer on it. All it said was 'Hammond Enterprises', and before you asked, I can't find anything about it in our files."

"Like tracing a Ghost." Halsey mused to herself.

"Indeed." Kalmiya said. "Ackerson deduced from the message that the only way to find them was to let them find us, but Parangosky refused to reveal who she suspected they wanted. There have been no attempts to further track it since 2547, which is when Operation: Red Flag took some serious leaps forward in the planning stages, and the funding for equipment of the Spartans took more priority."

Halsey nodded, and was about to say she knew who they wanted, but then the ground shook. And for the ground to shake through all the levels of concrete underneath the base, she knew it was trouble.

"I've recalled the Spartans. The King Under The Mountain File revealed a way out!" Kalmiya called.

Then the office shook very heavily, and Halsey fell to the ground.

The lights went out.

* * *

 **And on these cliffhangers and bombshells, I'm ending the first chapter of First Strike. I will admit, adding Tends to Rise was a last-minute addition, so I'm curious if you guys like him.**

 **Goodbye, fellow Legionairs. Please review, and I'll be sure to improve the story from the review**

 **Gharst Omenlumin**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello, Fellow miscreants. I have completed the second chapter of our First Strike.**

 **Please, Review, so I can improve on the parts I'm doing bad at.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Halo.**

* * *

Halo: First Strike Chapter 2

Six had just stabbed her knife in the heart of the elite that had her pinned, and had looked around for who had needed her help. And she saw Fol was kicked while in midair, and brought down by the Fleetmaster. And now he was hammering away at Fol's blade.

Six shortly thought about what she _should_ do, and what she _would_ do.

She wanted that Fol would just die. He had killed Kat, shooting her in the head. He had killed Emile, stabbing him in the heart after Emile had already been heavily wounded. He was likely responsible for Jorge's death, for he had died when a bunch of Ultra elites had ambushed him in the hanger, and had damaged the bomb while Six had been busy getting to the bridge. That required the precision timing of a Field-Marshal, and Fol was the only one that they knew was present on the planet at the time. He had killed countless of civilians, had traumatized even more, like Sara Sorvad. He deserved to die.

But on the other hand Six felt she had to save him. He hadn't shot at her any times since the Onager-cannon fight. In fact, he had saved her multiple times from the Flood. He had even done so at risk of his own life. He had saved John when he could have just let him fall, back on the elevator of the _Autumn_. He had taken account of Linda's injury back when they had captured a Spirit back at the control room. He even attempted to socialize with Six when they had to take a break due to their route being under a heavy conflict from both the Sentinels, the Flood and a bunch of hunters. Six felt she had an obligation to save him.

Then the Fleetmaster finally disarmed Fol, and held his blade high for a killing blow.

Six made a mental toss of a coin, and it decided her choice. And Six found she didn't like it one bit. But she went along with it anyway.

She jumped, activated her Energy Sword, and blocked the blow.

Six came at it so violently, that the way she blocked caused the blades to actually flash from the force of it, and the Fleetmaster visibly reeled back. He looked at Six, and snarled. "So. You are willing to sacrifice yourself for the one that killed about half of your team?"

Six took on a fighting stance, not saying a thing. She ignored the fact that the cut across her visor was obviously visible to the Fleetmaster, and that he was trying to provoke her. Six activated her second blade as well, and held it in front of the other, like a boxer would hold both fists in front of it, one before the other. Thel took on a different stance. He stood low, one blade held diagonally at his side, the other vertically low to cover his legs.

Six then jumped forward, the same time as Thel. Six slashed one blade high, and the other low. Thel moved to block both, but then Six adjusted the angle of one of the blades mid-slash, and her low-slash went high. It didn't hit anything vital, unfortunately, but she still slashed his head. His shields broke, and she slashed just behind his left eye. Six and Thel then both landed, and Six saw that Thel was shocked that an infidel like Six was able to hit him like that. Like he expected himself to be better than that.

 _So you thought himself invincible, huh? Good. Pride will be your downfall._

Six then looked at him. "I can go on all day, split-lip. Do you?"

The Elite looked at her with a snarl. "Your arrogance-"

"is well-earned." Six interrupted.

Thel then advanced slowly. Six saw from the corner of her eye that the Spec-ops Elites were doing so as well. Six just stood there.

Just as the three completely encircled her, Six jumped at one of the Spec-ops elites, blocked his high slash with both of her blades. But instead of landing on the floor, she maneuvered in the air so that she landed on the Elite's lower arms. She then jumped up again, and backflipped through the air, towards the other. She landed with both of her boots in the elite's face before he could react, and he went to the ground. The Fleetmaster came at her again, but Six slashed at it's head with both of her blades. And the Elite had actual trouble blocking her attack. It reared back, and Six drove it slowly towards the exit the other Elites were covering.

The other Spec-ops elites moved to engage, but Fol had gotten up about that time, and though they still attacked him, pedaled back to join their comrades near the escape pods. Six made a final stab at the elite's abdomen, and though it slashed them out of the way, it still accidentally exposed it's back to Six in order to do so successfully.

And that was a mistake. Six kicked at it's back, and it stumbled forward. Six then stabbed at it's head. It rolled out of the way in time, but was forced further back as John and Sam had dealt with their opponents as well, and John had picked up the dropped Plasma cannon. Both of them were firing at the remaining elites, which numbered at five in total, including the Field-Marshal and his Spec-ops bodyguards. The Spartans and marines forced the elites to take cover into the Escape pods.

And Cortana, who was still in the ship's systems, promptly shut their hatches on them, and launched the elites from the ship. Six looked around, and, after finding no new targets to kill, moved to the central platform that dominated the Bridge. She moved up the platform, only to find Fol already busy reactivating all systems. Six joined him, and heard a part of his conversation with Cortana.

"-lready done. There's nothing we can do except reactivate it manually." Fol said.

"And what if it's damaged? Then what?" Cortana asked.

"Then I really feel honored having known you."

Cortana sighed, and then looked quizzically at Six. Six nodded, and looked at Fol with a glare, even though Fol couldn't see it. "Don't _ever_ make me regret this choice, because between saving you and letting you die, I have no faith this choice will pay off." Six said sternly.

Fol nodded, and then gestured at the Nav-console. "Every Covenant ship has an AI, similar in purpose to your own, but with less personality and initiative. This one was smart, and has hidden itself somewhere. It had shut down the Slipspace-Drive the moment we unlocked the navigational systems. They can be unlocked manually, but are on the other side of the ship."

"So a small group of us goes there." Chips Dubbo said. "No problem."

"Yes problem." Cortana reported. The other cruisers have realized they have no flagship anymore, and are charging up their plasma-cannons and energy-projectors. And the bloody rodder had us maneuvered right into the middle of the formation during the fight. We're sitting ducks."

"Can you still maneuver?" John asked. Cortana's avatar, which appeared on one of the displays, nodded.

Six caught on on his idea. "Then buy us time by going around one of those planetary bodies. I'm going down to the engine room."

"You don't know how to reactivate the Slipspace-Drive." Cortana said.

 _(But I can.)_ the text appeared on her visor, and Six knew it was Tends to Rise. As instructed, he had taken cover when the fighting had started. Six turned to him, and nodded.

"There. Problem solved. Do what you can, Cortana. I'll be back." Six said, and moved through the bridge, exiting through the hallway they had come through. She noticed Sam was following as well. She turned to him. "Going along for the company, or because you have something to get off your chest?" she asked.

"The latter." he answered. "Combined with the fact that You need someone to cover your back, even though most of the crew are either dead or non-hostiles."

"Well, you clear the way. I give Rise close cover."

Sam nodded, and they rounded a corner. They saw a huddle of Huragok, conversing among themselves. They were signing in a flurry anyway, too fast for the translation software in her armor to track. Tends to Rise moved forward. ( _Please, wait for a moment. I will ask them to help us at the engine room._ )

Six nodded, and let him get ahead. He approached the group, and together they exchanged a flurry of signs. After a moment, Rise returned, and Six saw he looked disappointed.

 _(They are willing to help.)_ He began. ( _But a group of Unggoy have locked them out of the engine room, and threatened to shoot the reactor core if they attempt to enter.)_

This hardly deterred Six. "Then we move around them. There is an elevator shaft that connects with the engine room, right? So we take that route."

"Will make our route a bit longer." Sam noted.

"Beats the grunts blowing the reactor and killing us all." Six retorted. "We use stealth. You should try it sometime."

Six knew Sam rolled his eyes at that moment, and moved to an Engineer's hatch. Rise opened it, and Six used it to lower herself to the level below the engine room. After a moment she heard a thud, indicating Sam had arrived. Six looked at Rise, who followed behind her. "Rise, can you give us a head's-up when we are directly beneath the engine room? I want to know it so that I know where we are to go back up. Approximately, anyway."

 _(Of course, Reclaimer.)_ Rise told her.

"Happy you have a pet?" Sam asked her jestingly. "Because you talk with it more than you do with the rest of us."

"Would you rather have that I talk you to death?"

"No, thank you. You seem more at peace burning things."

Six nodded, and they continued walking on. After about two minutes of walking, they came across a few corpses of jackals. They seemed to have been choked to death, for two of them were holding their throats. "Must have been the result of Cortana draining the atmosphere out of certain sections of the ship." Six noted. She prodded one with the tip of her boot.

"Some way to die." Sam said. "Choking on your last breath, not knowing what was going on."

"Still better than being Flood-bait." Six noted.

"Anything beats being Flood-bait."

Six nodded, but Rise tapped her shoulder. ( _The Engine room is now above us. Take the elevator to your left, and you will make it there without the Unggoy noticing you._ )

"Thanks, Rise." Sam said. "Please wait here. We will give you the signal once the room is cleared."

( _Do be careful. The reactor could now be unstable, due to the Unggoy interfering._ )

"We'll watch our aim." Six said. She then opened the door to her right. It led into a large vertical shaft. Six saw the elevator was right below them, one floor down. She saw no visible cables, so she presumed the thing went upwards on magnetic rails, similarly to how a MAC-cannon was fired.

There were a lot of girders, however, so Six climbed on top of one. She then got a handhold of the next, and climbed up. She heard Sam climb after her, and curse as he hit his head.

"Caution: low ceiling." Six said.

"Very funny, for someone who has to stand on a chair in order to headbutt me."

"It is indeed." Six said. She then arrived at the door to the next floor. She presumed it was the engine room, so she silently pried it open a bit.

It was indeed the engine room. There was a large plasma core that dominated the center of the room, and about five grunts were just moving about, with no clear destination in mind. Six couldn't detect any Elites.

Sam came up alongside her, and she moved over so he could look as well. "Slipspace drive at the aft side of the room." he told her. "Right next to the plasma core. The engine nozzles aren't accessible from here, but I can detect a lot of heat on the other side of that wall."  
"I thought you didn't have any sensors like Linda had in her helmet."

"I can feel the heat from here. Can't you?"

"No, but my armor has the temperature regulated. Must be why I can't feel most of it."

Sam nodded, and drew a combat knife from his chest plate. Six did so as well. Together they moved through the engine room. They didn't draw their weapons, as Sam only had weapons that did too much damage to the engine room, and Six couldn't take them all down in time before the others damaged the Plasma Core.

Six got behind a pair that stood together, and butted their heads together real hard. Sam grabbed one in the air, and snapped his methane mask off with his knife, cutting off it's supply of fresh methane, which the creatures breathed.

It alerted the remaining two, though, and Six drew her Carbine. She hit one in the head. The other took cover behind the Plasma-Core, but suddenly flew aside, to the other side of the room.

Six looked, and saw Sam standing there. With a confident stance. "Rise, It's clear." Six called down the shaft. "You and your buddies can come in now."

Sure enough, after about twelve seconds, an entire flock of Engineers floated p the shaft, and all went busily to work in the engine room.

Six returned to look at Sam. "Did you use that last grunt as a soccer-ball?" she asked.

Sam removed his helmet, and took on a false look of innocence. "Me? Kicking an alien? Never"

"The same way I ain't a pyromaniac." Six said. She then raised Cortana. "Cortana, Rise is in the engine room, along with some friends. They'll have the SlipSpace-drive up and running in no time at all."

"It's too late." Cortana said.

* * *

Cortana had to divert the attention from Six and Rise as they left the bridge, with Sam following after a moment, cursing to himself. She opened a private channel between herself, John and Linda. "Awww, and there the young couple goes." she said. "Shame they won't admit it to themselves they like each other."

"Yeah." Linda said, and she added Johnson to the conversation, who was currently taking a bathroom break in one of the remaining escape pods. Not that he wanted to piss in the escape pod, but so far they hadn't been able to find a proper toilet, and Johnson really needed the break.

"Which reminds me," John said. "remember our bet, Linda?"

Linda looked confused for a moment, but then let out a slight curse. John already held his hand up. "Unless Johnson really wants it, I'll wait with cashing in until the end of the war. You're more skilled with it anyway." Linda nodded, and sagged her shoulders in relief.

"Same goes for me." Johnson said. "But I won't let you forget this."

"Bring it, sergeant TIHF." Johnson laughed.

Then Fol called over from the command platform. "I could use your help up here. Ship-to-ship combat ain't my _forte_."

John and Linda ran up the ramp, and each manned two of the stations. John noted his seemed like a weapons station.

"We're currently in a crossfire between 6 cruisers." Cortana reported over the general channel. "I'm trying to get her through the upper layers of Threshold's atmosphere, so the magnetic field of the planet ensures the Covenant can't fire on us. But we're only properly safe one 034 and B312 get the SlipSpace-drive onl-"

"Incoming text transmission." Fol reported. John saw his face then fell. "Oh, boy."

"What is it." Stacker asked from the main floor.

"The Holy City of High-Charity is on it's way here. And it's always has an escort of at least three hundred ships." Fol said.

"What's High-Charity?" Haverson asked.

"It's the combination of a massive Covenant Spacestation combined with their capital. It's hundreds of kilometers from bow to stern." Cortana answered. "Which means we need to get out of here in a hurry."

"Agreed." The Chief said. "Cortana, make haste for Threshold. And inform me once the SlipSpace drives are online."

"Aye." She said. "Blast, the Covenant AI has itself locked down in a section extremely far forward of the ship. It has shut all of it's systems down, the same way it likely did with the bridge. I can't get to it at this moment."

"And the good news?" Polaski asked.

"I've locked all conduits around it down, so it can't get to us either."

But then they entered Threshold's atmosphere, and Cortana had to shift her attention to flying the ship. One of the cruisers was following closely. The same one, Cortana noted to herself, that Thel had been launched towards, and that had collided with the _Ascendant Justice_ back when they were still in a Longsword. Cortana gritted her virtual teeth, and launched a volley of plasma bulbs, the data on how to do so provided by their new Huragok ally, Tends to Rise.

They struck the ship, but it continued onwards regardless. She observed as it took a geosynchronous orbit above them, not ramming them, but in an ideal position to prevent their escape. It charged it's energy projectors, ready to pounce on them from orbit, like it had likely done to a lot of human cities.

 _Alright, so you know a few tricks. Now, let me show you mine._ "Hang on." She called, and everyone got a good hold on something solid.

She then rolled the ship clockwise 180 degrees, presenting her ventral side to the cruiser above. She then did something she knew most wouldn't have come up with as fast as she did.

She put all her power into the two ventral energy projectors, and aimed them at the cruiser above. The Cruiser, seeing what she was up to, tried to fly out of it's range, and fired a few parting shots from her plasma cannons as it went.

But Cortana didn't let it get away without a scratch. She fired both energy projectors at the ship.

Both hit the fleeing cruiser, one amidship, one near the engine block. It vented plasma, and Cortana saw it was clearly hurt...

and then Cortana raised her ship's shields as the parting shots from the cruiser came at her. The shields absorbed most of the blow, and the carrier showed no external signs of damage. But it got blasted backwards seven hundred meters by the force of the blasts. Seven hundred meters deeper into the atmosphere than Cortana wanted to.

They entered the gas giant's gravity well, and were pulled inwards. This was very dangerous, for if they were into it too far, they wouldn't be able to get out, and likely be killed by the inevitable forces of Gravity. Cortana tried to alter her course, but it was to no avail. They were being pulled deeper into the planet.

"Cortana," Six came over the com. "Rise is in the engine room, along with some friends. They'll have the SlipSpace-drive up and running in no time at all."

"It's too late." Cortana said. "We are too far in the planet's gravity well. We are being pulled in, and can't get out."  
"So jump." Six said. "I am not an expert in physics, but I think we should just jump out of here through SlipSpace."

Cortana was about to call her insane, but then remembered Six had already admitted she was likely insane herself. She tried not to think about all the dozen things that could go wrong. The SlipSpace drive could collapse due to all the gravitational forces that were involved. The Portal could collapse on them just as they were passing through. The-

Oh, the Hell with it. She tried it anyway.

Surprisingly, the Slipspace-portal opened, and Cortana easily maneuvered the ship in. After a moment, they entered Slipspace, and the portal shut behind them, leaving the debris of Halo and the Covenant fleet behind.

She saw that the Covenant AI still in the systems was observing her calculations, before it withdrew from the systems. Cortana tried to track it down, but she found no trace.

 _Blasted_

But then she returned her attention to the others, and said "Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like to congratulate you on being the first passengers of a vessel that successfully attempted an In-atmospheric jump. Please feel free to move around the cabin."

Most of the marines cheered, and Haverson looked pleased. John and Linda, along with Fol, however, looked at her in concern. "Are you certain the fleet over Threshold couldn't have observed your calculations? Because if they did, then the war with Humanity will be a lot shorter."

"Relax." Cortana said. "The magnetic field of the planet and the gasses masked our readings. Even if they did observe our jump, they still couldn't see _how_ I did it." Cortana let confidence slip into her voice.

Fol still looked concerned. "And how about this ship's AI? It was still present, and could have observed what you did."

"I'll admit I'm still tracking it down, but I know it won't be able to hide forever."

That seemed to satisfy Fol. For the moment. "Good." He said. "Let's gather everyone here, and plan our next move. I doubt we want to end up at Sanghelios with merely one ship."

"I agree." The Chief said. He then opened a com to the engine room. "Sam, Six, get back here. We're planning our next move."

"I copy, Chief. We're en-route."

"Good." Chief shut the com. He turned to the others. "But until they get here, everyone get some rest. We're going to need it.

* * *

Sam had just helped a few engineers lift a heavy plasma block back in place after they repaired and upgraded it for a moment, before turning back to Six.

And immediately moved to her side. She was sitting on the ground, laying against the wall. She was visibly shaking.

And Sam though he heard a few sobs coming from her.

"Hey." he said, as he finally got to her. "What's wrong?"

Six stared blankly ahead of her, not moving. She didn't say anything.

"What is it?" Sam asked again.

Six looked at him again, and slightly depolarized her faceplate. And Sam knew something big was up. There was only one time she had done that, and that was when she had been raging on a dropship on their way back from the Truth and Reconciliation, seething over the fact she didn't get to hunt Fol, and trying to prove to them she was telling the truth by letting him look into her eyes.

But this time, Six had depolarized it further, to the point he could make out some definite features of her face this time.

She had, as she'd claimed, differently colored eyes, her right one Ice-Blue, while her other one was Fire-Orange. He couldn't see her entire face, but from what he could see, it was covered in scars. On her forehead alone, there were three of them, two accidentally forming into a cross in the center, with one line going up into her hair, and the third scar a line continuing on to her temple. And he could see until the underside of her mouth, with only her chin and jawline not visible. She had, by his count, at least twelve scars in total, with the most prominent ones being a cut along her chin that continued over her lips to the side of her nose, and, Sam noted, a small one that started at the corner of her mouth, and curved upwards, giving him the illusion she was smirking.

But he could see tears were rolling down one side of her face, and her eyes held the look of anger, sadness, and despair.

"Nothing in particular." Six finally said, her voice neutral and devoid of all emotions. "Just letting all the events of the last several weeks sink in. The Fall of Reach, Noble's end, Halo, The Flood, That bloody Fol, everything. And It ain't exactly pretty." Six turned to look ahead of her again. "Especially the sight of humans turning into Flood monsters."

"Maybe so." Sam said after a short silence. "But not all of it's bad. You met, and befriended, me, John and Linda. You gained a handy experience in fighting. You even have a new ally, even if you still hate his guts." Six chuckled at that, understanding his reference to Fol.

Sam paused again. "Look, all I want to say is... just... ah, hell. If you need someone to talk to, I'm here. You're a part of Blue-team. We look out for each other."

Six looked at him. And polarized her visor again, forming a face of death again, with the blood of enemies dried on it, and the cut on the right side of her visor going from the slight right of her visor to the far right corner, in a diagonal line, ending at the side where her visor ended and her helmet proper began. She seemed relieved, though.

"I ain't the type to talk about stuff like that. Thanks for the offer, though." with that, Six started to get up, and Sam was about to hold out his hand for help, when his com went off. "Sam, Six, get back here. We're planning our next move." it was the Chief, and it sounded like he wanted them there on the double.

"I copy, Chief." Sam said. "We're en-route."

"Good." there was a click, indicating John had shut the com down. Sam looked around.

Six had already found Tends to Rise, who was following her to one of the doors. "Well." Six said. "We'd better get moving before Johnson and Wilson start any wild rumors about us."

"Agreed." Sam said, and he ran with her and Rise towards the bridge.

They arrived after sprinting for a full five minutes. Sam was surprised the Huragok had managed to keep up with them.

Johnson, Wilson, Stacker and Dubbo were playing a game of cards, sitting in one of the trenches in a square. Haverson was busy interviewing Fol. He answered every question Haverson asked. John seemed to be talking with Cortana on the central platform, and Linda was cleaning her Sniper rifle. Locklear and Polaski were nowhere to be seen.

"Where are Locklear and Polaski?" Sam asked.

"Don't go looking for 'em." Wilson called from the trench. "They're... let's just say they want privacy."

Six chuckled, though Sam had no idea what either of them meant. Linda noticed, though, and answered his unspoken question. "They're putting the tail of flowers and bees to practice. If you catch my meaning." Sam noticed Linda found it amusing as well.

Then Sam realized it, and blushed, ashamed he hadn't gotten it sooner. "Ah, I see." Sam saw that Six was approaching John and Cortana, and moved over to sit with Linda. Linda moved over, and gave him one of her cleaning rags. Sam saw she'd gotten it from the Longsword. Sam unhooked his minigun from his back, and took the barrels apart from the main gun, cleaning parts as he removed them. Linda gave him a sideways glance as she did the same with her Sniper rifle, only using different parts.

Then Six clapped her hands, and everyone moved to stand near the ramp to the central platform. Sam, letting the parts of his half-assembled minigun lay where they were. Wilson was shuffling the cards in his hands, before putting them in a pouch in his hand.

 _So the cards were his._

Sam saw him move over to Six, and toss her a data-chip. Six looked it over, and put it into her helmet. After a few seconds she pulled it out, nodded to Wilson, and put it in her pouch.

Wilson then took off his ODST-Helmet, and Sam got his first look at what he looked like.

He was in his forties, had black hair with graying edges, a slight beard, and dark-brown eyes. He had a tanned skin, and, assuming his accent, from either New-Zealand on earth, or Demeter, where most New-Zealanders colonized during the time when humans started colonizing other worlds.

Then another door hissed open, and Polaski and Locklear walked in. Their clothes and hair were slightly disheveled, and they shared glances. Sam did his best to ignore them.

Wilson, however, didn't. "awww, you didn't invite me? Auch!" that last part came as Stacker bumped Richie's side quite hard. And around the kidney, too.

"Shut up." Stacker said, his voice heavy as usual. "Let the couple be."

Haverson and Fol finally approached, and that completed the group. The Chief stood on the top of the platform, with Six standing behind him, and slightly to his right. Cortana's avatar was on the display.

Everyone else, who consisted of Sam, Linda, Fol, Haverson, sergeants Johnson and Stacker, Dubbo, Wilson, Locklear, Polaski and Tends to Rise, who stood at Linda's side.

"I've conferred with Cortana" John began, and Sam appeared to pay attention. "and she has given us a current summary of our situation. One: we currently are in slipspace after an in-atmospheric jump. Something Humanity has never achieved before. Two: we are currently aboard a Covenant Carrier, which is a potential treasure trove of technology humanity can exploit, with the help of Tends to Rise and his group of Huragok." Rise nodded his head in response, and took over for a short time. ( _While most of you were busy here, I spoke with my kin. They have all agreed to help you, and are willing to join Humanity on Earth._ )

most of those present nodded, and the Chief continued. "Three: In Fol, who has genuinely been convinced to fight with us, we have a good store of information in Covenant tactics, and he has shown to be reliable."

Fol nodded. Wilson raise his hand. "Yes, Wilson?" John asked.

"I just want to know why Fol defected, sir. I understand what the Lightbulb told him is against the Covenant's religion, but I thought he was an atheist."

"This... _revelation_ , for lack of a better word, made my cause to fight humanity, because we were enemies due to the Covenant, undone. With the Prophet's proven false, my Clan, which is the leading body of the colony Sang'Katarn, will likely rebel against them. I have long had respect for humanity despite the hostilities, and desire that instead of making this a three-way war, my clan will join Humanity in dissolving the Covenant."

"But why now?"

"Let's just say that at the beginning of the war, someone joined Sang'Katarn that made me doubt the legitimacy of this war."

Wilson nodded, satisfied with what he heard.

"What we need" The Chief said, getting everyone on track. "is a UNSC vessel, for Cole Protocol subsection 7 forbids us from taking any Covenant material back to human space, for fear of unknown tracking devices."

Fol nodded. "It was attempted by the Prophet of Truth, by trading arms with a human insurrectionist colony about two decades ago. It was foiled before it mapped even a tenth of human space, but it could still be going on without my knowledge."

John nodded, and sam found he agreed as well. Haverson raised his hand. "So how do you plan to get back at human space, chief? I acknowledge your tactical command of this mission, and I know your authority has the backing of High Command and Section Three. I won't argue you on that point. But with the discovery of the new technology on this ship, your mission could be superseded."  
"What other mission?" Locklear asked, his voice suspicious, and various others were wondering as well. Most were either looking at a Spartan, or Lieutenant Haverson.

Haverson shrugged. "I see no reason to keep this information classified at this point, Chief."

"I agree." Cortana said from the display at the Chief's back. "Don't worry, the room's cleared of eavesdroppers."

The Chief hesitated, and Sam knew what would come next was hard for him. "My team and I..." The Chief paused, and Sam decided to pick it up. "Our mission was to capture a Covenant Ship, board and capture it like pirates of old, and capture one of their religious leaders from their own space. Command hoped it would force the Covenant to the negotiating table, with the hopes of achieving a cease-fire."

No one said a word. Fol finally raised a hand. "Two things." He started. "One: Did, or _do_ , you plan to return from this mission alive?"

Linda shook her head at that, and Fol continued. "And two: It won't work. Unless you transmit the right code within a microsecond of entering High-Charity's space, and those codes are changed every few minutes, you will get blasted out of the sky before you could say 'retreat'. For those Religious leader are always on High-Charity, and even _if_ you landed on High-Charity, _if_ you got a Prophet, and _if_ you got out of there, it would motivate the Covenant only to fight harder, to either free or avenge him."

The Chief and the rest of Blue-Team looked at him. Sam was... disappointed. It meant their mission was in vain. Fol looked at him. "I'm willing to follow you if you do want to continue on it, but realize it will be futile."

The Chief nodded, and looked at Haverson, and at the others. And Sam did as well, and he noted the exhaustion on everyones faces. They had all been through Hell on Halo, and he knew most of them weren't ready for this mission.

"What's on this ship" Haverson said. "can save the human race. And wasn't that the goal of your original mission?"

"Yes." The Chief said. There was a second of silence, and the Wilson spoke up. "What about Reach? There ought to be a few Human ships up there that are serviceable, or can easily be brought operational again. We won't violate this 'Subsection 7', because last time I checked, Reach was already found by the Covenant."

"Besides." Six added. "There are... chances, no matter how small, that a few of our own down there. Let's go there, to rule it out as a possibility, if nothing else."

"Indeed." Haverson said. "Very well. Cortana, set course for Reach. We exit slipspace near the edge of the system, and determine if the situation is good or not. If it's too hot, we jump away and find another route home."

"Acknowledged, Lieutenant. Be advised, this ship travels a lot faster through SlipSpace than our vessels. ETA is thirteen hours, so get relaxed."

Wilson nodded, and handed the cards to Stacker. "Well, unless anyone has anything important to say, I'm going to practice my skills in a Spirit."

"I'll evacuate the ship, then." Chips said, and Polaski, Stacker and Six laughed. Six then moved over to the escape-pod bay.

Everyone went back to their previous business. Haverson and Fol sat down in a corner again, for their interviews. Stacker, Johnson, Dubbo and Locklear went back into the trench, and restarted the card game. Wilson strolled to the hanger, with, after Locklear's insistence, Polaski, to teach him how to fly. Linda and Sam went back to cleaning their weapons, and Tends to Rise joined them, mostly observing. John went to lay down and catch some sleep. Sam saw Six move to the escape pod bay. He saw she inserted the chip in her helmet again, and then the door shut behind her.

Sam looked at Linda, and asked the unspoken question between the spartans. "Do you think anyone's still alive? With over three hundred ships, I think even Earth wouldn't stand a chance."

"Fred will come through for them. And we know at least one of them is alive for sure."

"Who?"

"Jun. Six's teammate from Noble-Team. He was escorting Halsey, remember? As she'd told back at Alpha base on Halo."

Sam nodded. "I remember. But I was talking about Kelly, Fred, Will, Joshua, Grace and the others. Did any of them make it?"

Linda stopped cleaning for a second, and then looked at him. "If what you and John say is true, then they had no chance against those numbers. We're excellent soldiers, but against the numbers they reported? I don't think they could survive that. And let's not even talk about the glassing."

Sam agreed, and he went on cleaning the parts of his minigun. As he started reassembling it, he noticed Fol got up from his conversation with Haverson, and walk to the same door Six had left the bridge through.

 _These would be an interesting thirteen hours._

* * *

It took Six a while to find one, but at last she finally found a quiet room for herself.

She had left the bridge after John had given that briefing. She had promptly left the bridge as soon as it was over, determined to find a good and quiet place for herself. She had found one after about an hour of searching, an abandoned and emptied armory by the looks of it.

She looked around, and moved a few of the racks around, so she could use them as exercise equipment, like pull-ups and such.

After about three minutes, she was done, and she started exercising, but it went too easy for her liking. She looked up, sure that Cortana could see her. "Cortana, can you increase the gravity in this room by three hundred percent?"

"Done." Cortana said, and indeed, the floor started to tug at her boots a lot more.

"Thank you." Six then pulled out the chip Wilson had given her.

As asked, he had given her a copy of his 'Epic' music playlist. And Six, having found a new taste for it, was letting it blast away in the confines of her helmet, trying to keep her mind of the events of both the last few weeks, and the last few hours.

The last few weeks, because she didn't want to think about them. Those had been harrowing weeks. The accusing look of Sara Sorvad, the daughter of the now deceased Laszlo Sorvad, claiming in anger that Spartans weren't human anymore. That statement had hit close to one of Six's personal issues, namely the fact she was extremely conscious of the fact that she hadn't had a normal life, and likely never would.

The next images of the last few weeks flashed before her eyes as the music played. Jorge throwing her off of the Corvette, about fifteen seconds before he opened that SlipSpace-portal that led into oblivion. Kat, shot in the head by Fol Katarn'ee, or Katarn, for she didn't understand the significance of that double ee at the end. Kat had fallen into Six's arms, and Six still mourned her death to this day. Carter, crashing his Pelican into an approaching Scarab tank, in order to buy her and Emile time to get to the _Autumn_. Emile, stabbed in the heart by Fol Katarn (She decided to just settle for Katarn) after Emile had fought off two zealots before succumbing to his wounds. Linda, laying heavily wounded on the Autumn, dying. Six had immediately moved to help her, and had succeeded in saving her life. _At least one bright spot in all the muck around her life._

The next thing that flashed before her were the events on Halo, with her and Blue-Team landing on the ring after Keyes entrusted them with Cortana. The holdout at the valley-facility, where Six had to save Linda's life once again, as she'd suffered internal injuries during the crash. And Linda promptly got up to join the fight, despite Six' rather vulgar insistence she shouldn't. Six snickered at the memory.

Then the night at Alpha base came, and the night Six had opened up to someone for the first time in years, if not Decades. And where she'd been named an official member of Blue-Team.

Then the raid on the _Truth and Reconciliation_ happened, and she'd learned that the blasted Fol had in fact survived their encounter, and had taken the Shoulder-plate of Emile as a trophy. Then the separation of their forces, the underground facility...

And the Flood.

Six knew the memories and nightmares from that place would haunt her forever. The initial encounter, where everyone except her and Johnson had been turned into one of the creatures. Where they had nearly died, were it not for the fact Fol had saved them. Where Six, in an act of desperation to stop the Flood, had sabotaged the elevator, and she had convinced the others to make a last stand alongside her. And promptly abandoning it after they had been outnumbered, and Fol had found a way to divert the Flood's attention to them instead of escaping to the surface, and they had run for about Half an hour.

How Blue-Team had come for her, and they'd informed her the Flood had gotten out anyway, and that her effort had been for nothing. When the Library happened, and she'd fought alongside Fol and the others, taking down new large Flood forms, which Fol had coined 'Juggernauts'. And where she'd had an unpleasant argument with Sam, when he had stupidly shot a rocket inches past her head.

And then the betrayal of the monitor, and where Fol had officially turned to Humanity's side for the duration of the war. A part of Six still didn't believe it was genuine, but she accepted that the others wanted him alive.

Then the return to the _Autumn_ , and the mental assault on her mind, which came to her complete surprise. The pain had stopped now, but Six still expected to feel the headaches again, despite the fact the Gravemind was now dead.

Then they'd taken the _Ascendant Justice_ , and they'd boarded it with the other survivors, and they'd assaulted the bridge. Where she'd watched Fol being knocked down and nearly killed, and where Six had the ideal opportunity to let him die.

And, for reasons Six still didn't understand, she had saved his skin. She had thrown herself between his attacker and had driven him back, and Cortana had literally launched him off the ship. Six had thrown a mental flip of a coin, but why she had went with it instead of letting him die, or even outright killing him, eluded her.

Six had then traveled to the engine room with Sam and Tends to Rise, where she'd helped him secure the engine room.

And where she, unexpectedly, had a mental breakdown. She had a flashback at the mention of the word soccer-ball, because her sister had played it often. And it had brought up a lot of other memories, ones she didn't want to see. The horrors of Jericho VII's fall, the past few days of fighting the Flood, and the time she had spent among the insurrection.

She had often been deployed undercover among the insurrection, sometimes for days, sometimes for months, and often had to kill every single member that she's found. She did it with pleasure at the time, because of her violent tendencies. But with each atta- no, _massacre_ , she learned more and more about herself. Namely, that she wanted something else with her life other than being ONI's enforcer.

ONI had her then deployed among Noble-team, after she had taken down a rather large movement, and she had broken down a bit after killing a child.

She didn't see it at the time, only that it was aiming a pistol at her. But she had inspected the corpse after hitting her in the head, and learned it was in fact a twelve year old girl. Six had been shocked, and had resolved to avoid fighting humans as long as possible. ONI, noticing her change in character as well, had reassigned her, and she fought the Covenant with renewed ferocity.

All of those memories had flooded her at once, and despite her Eidetic memory, she hadn't been prepared for the flood of it. She had sat down for a second, trying to gather her thoughts and composure. But apparently it had been longer than a second, for Sam had rushed to her side, trying to help her. He had even offered to be willing to listen to her if she wanted to talk. Six wasn't one to talk about this kind of thing, but she had truly appreciated the offer. Six, in a moment her guard was down, had even let him see her face through her visor, making him the first one she knew closely to see her face since Reach, hell, even

Six had no idea what to think of Sam. He was kind, had a healthy sense of Humor, and had a taste for explosives. Six found she truly liked him, despite her initial denial when Linda had asked her about it shortly before the _Truth and Reconciliation_ raid. She had even, inadvertently but still, promised Sam a date. It was more of a promise that she would buy him a drink, and that he would bring the food, but it was a date none the less. She truly dreaded the day Linda would bring up that subject again.

Then a door opened in the armory, and she turned to look while in the middle of a sit-up while hanging from a bar of a rack.

Fol entered the room, and he headed straight for her. _Great_.

Six unhooked herself from the rack, turned down the volume of her music, and approached him.

"What do you want?" she asked.

Fol looked at her, his head slightly tilted. "I want to know something. You hate me to the core, and yet you saved me from Thel, when he could have easily killed me for you, or you could have even killed me yourself. Why?"

Six looked at him, straight into his one eye. "I wasn't gonna let him rob me of the opportunity to kill you myself."

Fol's mandibles shaped into a smile again, and he made a chuckle. It unnerved her a bit.

"An amusing answer, but I suspect it isn't the truth. Am I wrong?"

Six thought for a moment. She still had no answer to that question herself, despite pondering it a lot. She decided to give him the honest answer.

"I was conflicted, I admit. Forced to choose between finally getting to see you die, and saving a comrade. Yes, since you have defected, you are one of ours now. I made a mental flip of a coin, and it told me to save you. Why I went with it instead of killing you or letting you die, I don't know."

Fol nodded. "I understand. You haven't figured it out entirely yourself." He paused, and grabbed something from his lower back, holding it out to Six.

Six froze when she saw it was Emile's thick shoulder plate, with his Kukri still attached to it.

"I lied for a second, for I came to you for two things. I wanted to give this to you. It belongs to your team, so you are the rightful owner anyway. Take good care of it."

He then grabbed her hand, and put the plate into it. He turned to leave. Six was still frozen for a second, before she lay it on a crate. She then had an idea.

"Wait." she called to him. Fol stopped, and turned to her.

"Can you teach me how to _properly_ fight with an Energy Sword?" Six said. It took all of her will-power to actually ask it, with her partial hate for him blocking it. But he had handed her back the armor plate when he didn't need to, even while he knew she still hated him. That earned him a bit of her respect.

"I know I'm a natural at fighting in close quarters, but up till now, I've mostly been improvising with it. I want to know proper techniques, not merely have to slash and stab around."

Fol seemed surprised by her request, and Six feared for a moment that he would refuse.

But then he took on his odd smile again, and he nodded. "Of course."

He then activated his blade, and they went at it for hours, with Fol providing examples before Six practiced them on him. And Six learned a lot from him.

And she found she enjoyed it.

After about five hours, Fol stopped it, and Six looked at him. "Why did we stop? I'm just getting the hang of it."

Fol actually laughed out loud. "That's my problem: You know everything now. All I can teach you now are... Kata's I think the synonym is. But you know all defenses and attacks by nature, and, as you said, you're a natural at this. I've got nothing of value to teach you."

Six looked at him. "You're serious?"

"Quite. Who taught you to fight like that? I'm curious."

Six thought for a moment. That was a particularly painful period of her life. But she decided she could tell him a little bit.

"I've shown a particular interest in fighting as a child, and practiced it at a very young age. I turned out to be a natural at anything involving fighting at close range. I taught multiple fighting styles to myself from documentaries about fighting, and enhanced it with movies that were far above my age. I wasn't allowed to see them, but I got them regardless." she paused. "I only got a few formal lessons about it during my training as a Spartan. And even then, the teachers quit after I constantly beat them in fights."

Fol nodded. "As you said, self-taught." he then gestured at her with his sword, and raised it again. "Still, you prove to be quite the challenge in a fight. Again?"

Six unhooked her second blade, and raised both. She nodded.

"Again."

Both jumped towards the other, their blades aimed towards the other.

* * *

Jun led them through the base towards the armory. It was quite a bit distant from the medical bay, but thankfully to Fred, the time was filled by Will hounding Jun with questions.

It gave Fred an opportunity to talk with Kalmiya in private.

"Kalmiya, can you pull up Noble's service record?"

The AI, of which he had a fragment in his head for navigational purposes, pulled up the right files. Fred scanned over them. They were what one could expect from a Spartan, and the only anomaly Fred saw was that they were part of the UNSC army instead of the navy.

It didn't reveal what he wanted to know, however.

"Can you go further back? Towards where they were trained?" Jun perplexed Fred, for if they had more spartans than just their class, then why didn't they hear of more of their encounters? Fred wanted an answer to that, but Jun wasn't supplying one to Will.

"Those files are restricted, Fred." Fred wanted to persist, but Kalmiya spoke on. "But who's here to arrest us? I have, however, got nothing other than a planet at the moment. My main Fragment has found files that may contain more information, but until I reintegrate, I can't supply you with answers. Through here."

a final door opened, and Fred walked inside. Indeed, there were two racks in the armory, though they were very long. One side had the weapons Halsey had talked about. The other had a large array of Mjolnir parts. A few of the parts lighted up.

"These are the Prototype Mark-VI parts. The others you all already have. Jun, through here. I have a new suit standing by just for you."

Jun nodded, and moved over to an armor assembler.

An armor assembler was a new type of armor assembly system Fred had only heard about shortly before Operation: Red Flag. Fred had heard it could assemble and reassemble armor in about three minutes, which was a new record for most of them. He then moved over to the new weapons. Then something caught his eye, and he moved over.

It seemed to be an upgraded version of a Spartan Laser, something he had used often, but which always quickly drained. He hefted it. It's muzzle opened up, and he saw it was, though more streamlined and such, not that different from the original Spartan Laser. He put it on his back, and grabbed one of the other weapons.

It was similar in appearance to Jun's DMR, but it's scope was a square instead of a circle. It also had thirty-six rounds instead of fifteen. Fred lifted it. The Iron Sights that a DMR had weren't present, and the weapon, with ammo, was more balanced than a DMR.

Then he heard a new, churning sound, and Fred turned around.

Jun had stepped into the armor assembler, which consisted of a ring, with handholds for the hands and feet, and had about five claws on it. It removed Jun's current armor, and attached new armor to it. The new armor, though obviously paying homage to Jun's old armor, was more streamlined, and was more similar to Fred's new armor. Then it finished, and finally changed the helmet, and Fred got a look at the man's face.

Jun was caucasian, was bold, and had blue eyes. Jun had a tattoo on the side of his face, which consisted of a fist holding three arrows. He had a haunted look in his eyes, likely from what happened to Reach.

Jun grabbed the new helmet, which was identical in appearance to his old one, and put it on. Jun then grabbed a duffel bag, and gestured upwards as he spotted Fred looking at him.

"I don't think the targets up above are gonna sit still while we sit here. Grab all the new prototype pieces, and put them in the bags, so we can attach a few of them to the armor of your friends."

Fred nodded. That made sense. He looked at Will, who was admiring a Rocket Launcher. Fred punched him. "Don't let Grace see you do that. Or Sam. They'll talk your ears off."

Will nodded, and continued bagging most of the weapons.

Then the ground shook heavily, and Fred knew there was trouble. If the ground shook while you were in a heavily secured, underground facility built to take blows, it was never a good sign.

Kalmiya's avatar appeared at the door. "I've found a way out. Let's get the doctor and get out of here. Isaac and Vinh are already on their way." Fred nodded, and grabbed the bags he had already filled. The only weapons he noted weren't in bags yet were 2 SMG's. He grabbed those, and threw the bag over his shoulder. He ran back towards the medical facility, following Kalmiya's avatar, which was unnecessarily running ahead. Will and Jun followed.

They arrived at the lab. Kelly was emerging from an office with Doctor Halsey. Blood ran from Halsey's nostrils. "Her office collapsed." Kelly explained. "A support beam missed her by a centimeter."

Kalmiya's hologram appeared. "Fred, unload my fragment. Kelly's already got the main program, and I need to reintegrate." Fred complied, and Kelly put Kalmiya's chip into her head after Fred handed his fragment to her. After a moment she discarded the chip, now useless.

"I've triggered the WHITE GLOVE charges underneath the base." Kalmiya said. "Three minutes until this base is nothing but rubble."

"And where are we going?" Isaac asked, as he and Vinh entered the room.

"The tunnels." Kalmiya answered. "The mountain is riddled with them, both from the times it was mined for titanium and from lava-tubes when this place was still a volcano. They'll cover us as the base detonates."

Fred nodded, and took point. Kelly went next, covering Halsey, followed by Will, who carried the prototype weapons and prototype armor parts. Jun came next, who covered them with his Sniper Rifle. Isaac and Vinh covered the rear.

They went unopposed for a long time, until they got to a five-way intersection. Kelly held up her hand, and everyone stopped.

Fred looked again, and he saw nothing. He was about to ask kelly what she saw...

when two zealots decloaked, accompanied by a Field-Marshal. Everyone froze, as although they had their backs turned to them, barely three meters separated them.

Jun took a crouch, and took proper aim at one of them, though he held fire, waiting for Fred's command. Fred holstered the SMG's, and grabbed his combat knives from his shoulders. He saw Kelly tense up, ready to jump assault the final one.

Then the Field-Marshal said something in it's own language, and they moved on further into the facility. Fred started to relax.

Then tensed as the three rounded a corner, and one of the Elites looked straight at him. He roared, and charged towards them.

He made it two steps before he fell to the ground, killed by a headshot from Jun. Fred was impressed, for the only other person he knew could make a shot like that was Linda.

But then the other two elites appeared again, and the Field-Marshal grabbed his swords, and charged as well. Jun fired at it's head three times, but the Shields surprisingly held. Then he was on them, and Fred jumped at him. He evaded the blade from the Field-marshal, and jumped at him, giving it a round-house kick to the head. It staggered, and was about to stand up again...

when three more sniper-shots sounded across the hallway, and the Field-Marshal fell back down, his head having multiple holes in it now. Fred even saw two of it's mandibles had been severed.

Fred looked around for the last elite. He had run off, it's steps still visible in it's companion's blood.

"This is getting even weirder." Halsey said. "The only other time I observed an Elite retreat was back at Visegrad Relay, and that was because it had what it came for, and had no further purpose there. Jun can testify to that."

Fred agreed, but then he looked at his mission timer. 00:53:92. They had to hurry.

"Later, doctor. Let's worry about getting into the mines first."

"The entrance is just thirty meters ahead." Kalmiya supplied. "It's a grate of a ventilation shaft. It leads down far enough that we'll be saved from the blast."

"And the downside?" Fred asked.

Kalmiya's avatar showed on his HUD, and she smiled. "Feet first into Hell, Spartan. The landing's quite rough, so be careful."

Fred nodded, understanding. It was a far way down, so he would take on quite velocity. He looked back at the others.

"I'll go first. Kelly, take the Doctor on the second turn. Will, you send the supplies through first before following. Everyone else, just enjoy the ride."

They all nodded, and Fred opened the grate as they arrived at it. He jumped in first.

He fell for twenty seconds non-stop, and thought it would never end, when the shaft curved away, and slowly went from vertical to horizontal. As it finally reached horizontal, he saw it ended into a large cavern, and that there were large tracks leading in both directions, likely left over from the days this place was mined for Titanium.

"I'm clear." He called. "Will, be careful upon going down. It slowly curves back to horizontal, and you could collide with the boxes as they grind to a stop."

"I copy" Will said.

They all followed next. Kelly, holding Halsey under her arm, emerged first, followed by Will, who actually held the crates and duffel bags under his arms. Jun, Isaac and Vinh followed, and no sooner had she emerged than a really large explosion sounded from above, and Fred saw the edges of the shaft heat up.

Everyone moved to either side of the tunnel, away from the shaft. The next moment, flames emerged from it, followed by a lot of debris. Then there was silence.

"Cellar:" Kalmiya said, her voice mimicking that of a elevator of a superintendent facility, like in New-Mombasa on Earth. "Tunnels, Flames, unknown alien symbols.

* * *

Halsey looked at Jun after she finally finished up with reading the files Kalmiya had downloaded from Araqiel.

They had been in the tunnels for about five days, and Halsey had been busy. On the first day she had properly treated all of the injuries every Spartan had sustained, to the point that she had Flash-cloned Kelly a new lung in a shoebox-sized cloning tank. The second day, she had been busy improving some of the new armor parts, and installing them after they were completed.

On the third day, Halsey had read the reports on Graves' Vengeance and Legionary Armada, and had drawn her own conclusions, namely that Graves was indeed looking for _her_ , and that he had narrowed down her location to Earth, Reach, and something called _Infinity_. Halsey knew an ONI project when she saw one, and made sure to look up what _Infinity_ was. But Graves had hit a road block when he discovered something related to the 'Legionary Armada' files, and had gone silent since. Not untraceable, as originally surmised by Kalmiya, merely a trace gone cold due to a lack of activity from the suspect.

The Legionary Armada files were just that: Suspected Fleet movements of a Covenant Fleet. The only odd thing, however, was that the ships sighted had Human-weapons installed, like MAC-cannons and Shiva Missiles. Halsey surmised them as a mercenary group at first because of their erratic movements, but paid closer attention when she noticed a connection in their targets: Everywhere they went, they took down the local forces, recruited from the criminal population, killed corrupt officials that somehow failed their troops, and left the planets glassed. They moved with purpose and precision, and Ackerson had shown interest in contacting them due to the rumor they were mere mercenaries, but had for some reason backed off. There was nothing beyond the beginning of 2551, and no further movements have been recorded.

On the fourth day, she had, upon Kalmiya's insistence, read all of the S-III files and the star-chart file, and drawn a rough conclusion: Ackerson had his own Spartan-Program.

She had drawn this conclusion from three things. One: the Star-chart file contained coordinates to a inhabitable planet close to Human-Space, and yet was called off-limits by ONI. The File had started with 'CPOMZ', which Halsey deduced was an acronym for 'Chief Petty Officer Mendez', who had been a trainer in the Spartan-II program.

Two: The S-III files contained medical reports on all of her Spartans, specifically the reports about the Augmentation procedures, and the drugs that were used in the process of recreating it.

And Three: There were hundreds of files about orphans from Colonies ravaged by the Covenant. After only a minute of searching, she had found Jun's name among the list, with a picture that matched the file Halsey had been given upon her initial research into Noble-team, back when she had looked to them for a good escort of Cortana's fragment. And the other members of Noble-team had been found among them as well shortly thereafter.

That had set her mind on it, and Halsey was now formulating her questions for the Spartan.

The only other one currently with doctor Halsey, Kelly, was currently comparing notes between her experience with Kalmiya and John's experience with Cortana. Kalmiya had supplied the necessary files, and had noted that Kelly would be the perfect partner for Kalmiya once it was time to hand her over to a Spartan. Halsey had already decided Kelly would be the one to carry her, so Kalmiya's choice was only confirmation that her choice was the right one.

And now, on the fifth day, Halsey had read the King Under The Mountain files, to discern what Ackerson's interest was in this mountain. And she had easily deduced that an alien structure was underneath the mountain, of the same race that had built the massive ship in the Babd Catha Ice Shelf. It helped provide some clue as to why the Covenant were so interested in this place, as they'd attacked Noble-team in massive numbers during Halsey's attempt to decrypt the data from that ship. It was a miracle all of Noble had survived that assault. But what exactly sparked the Covenant's interest at this site, Halsey had no clue. But it was important, if only because the Covenant were interested in it.

And now, upon finishing reading that file, she looked up at Jun, and started her questions.

"Jun." the Spartan looked at him. "unlike back at CASTLE base, I have only one question this time."

Jun nodded. "Alright. Ask away."

Halsey looked at his visor. "Are you a Spartan-III?"

Jun hesitated for a moment, and Halsey knew she had hit the mark. But he still denied it's existence. "No, Doctor."

Halsey pressed on, and showed him his file. "Then you aren't Jun-A266, the same one pictured here?"

Jun looked at the file, and Halsey thought he sighed. Then the man took off his helmet. He seemed resigned. "I guess there's no longer any use denying it. Yes, I am a Spartan-III, and if anyone asked, I was to tell them I was a Spartan II. Same went for the other III's. I will be honest, doctor, you aren't allowed to know the full truth, but I don't see anyone here to come here to kill you. At least not for that."

Halsey nodded. Ever since CASTLE base had been taken care of, the Covenant had been churning away at the mountain, digging them out. Even now, Halsey heard another explosion upstairs. The Spartans had been moving deeper into the caves, hoping to evade the Covenant for as long as possible.

"I was trained at Camp Currahee, by Chief Mendez and Lieutenant Ambrose. I was only selected because I was an orphan, but immediately after training, I was removed from my company because I fit in the Cat-II group."

"Cat-II group?" Kelly asked, who moved over with Kalmiya to join the conversation. Halsey noted she had inserted Kalmiya into her brain.

"People who fit the genetical criteria of the Spartan-II program." Jun explained. "There weren't many of us, about three or four per company of three hundred. Our augmentations were perfected, and the success rate rose from forty-four percent to one hundred percent. Those of the Cat-II were pulled out of our companies and folded into special operations groups. The rest..." Jun paused. "The others were all put on suicide missions that were too costly to send ODST's, but weren't rendered important enough to send Spartan-II's."

Halsey was silent for a moment, respecting the dead.

But only for a moment. "Jun, I am sorry. But what we need to-"

"Doctor." Fred said over the Com. "I've found something. I think it's what you said might be down here."

"I copy." Halsey said. "We're on our way." Halsey turned to Jun. "I would like to discuss this matter with you later, but I realize what Fred has found is more important. But know this, Jun: You did a good job, and Mendez and Ambrose did well."

and then she went on into the tunnel, headed for Fred. Kelly shared a look with Jun that conveyed puzzlement, and together they followed her.

* * *

Kelly noticed the walls were glowing as soon as they entered the tunnel system. Kalmiya automatically polarized her visor as they entered the tunnels, which were becoming more and more artificial. For one, the corners were becoming more and more straight. For another, the walls appeared more solid and straight, no longer like layered granite.

Kalmiya seemed to be humming to herself. Kelly paid closer attention to it, and noticed it was a nursery rhyme; Twinkle twinkle little star.

"Got a thing for stars Kalmiya?"

Kalmiya immediately stopped. "Well, I picked you, didn't I?"

Kelly laughed, and then looked at the lower right corner of her visor. It was their unspoken agreement formed after two days: If Kelly looked at that corner, Kalmiya would show her avatar there. Kalmiya held herself to it, as usual.

"I don't dislike it Kalmiya, but I noticed you often hum that tune. I'm curious why."

Kalmiya nodded, and answered the question. "I have it left over from my donor, similarly to my shining personality. It's part of who I am. Like you have a thing with rabbits."

Kelly could understand that. But to see Kalmiya have something like that was... _interesting_.

Kelly found she could actually relate to the AI. _Was that how John thought about Cortana?_

Then they entered a large room with a lot of balconies. It reminded Kelly of the Colosseum from the ancient roman empire, but instead of tilted backwards, the line of balconies, which numbered twelve in total, were vertically straight. Kelly glanced down to the floor below. It was at least a hundred kilometers down. "Mind the gap." Kelly said, mostly to herself.

" _You_ mind the gap. There's two of us in here now, remember?"

Kelly rolled her eyes, and then looked around the tiered chamber. It was about three kilometers in diameter, and in the center something was glowing a bright white.

Kelly caught up with the others. Fred was preparing a line and a Grappler, which he shot into the wall. He descended and, after confirming the line was still good, signaled for the others to come down. Kelly went second-last, followed by Jun. They all traveled to the center of the chamber, which is where the glow seemed to originate from. It seemed, however, that they were going further away from it to her. She then checked her motion-tracker.

They were getting further apart by the second, and were already separated by dozens of meters.

"Stop." she called, and everyone stopped. "We're getting scattered. Regroup." they all gathered back around Halsey.

This was useless. They weren't getting there with just seeing it. Who the hell were these beings, anyway?

"How the hell do we get there?" Kalmiya asked her. Kelly, frustrated, closed her eyes, and walked.

And seemed to finally get closer to the light, despite going back the way the had come. Fred noticed, too.

"Kelly, you have the best sense of orientation. Pick a spot, go there, and we'll follow you."

"Affirmative." Kelly said. After a while, they were all in a conga-line, with Kelly in the lead, followed by Fred, Halsey, Jun, Will, Isaac, and Vinh going last. After a while, she noticed a glow coming through her eyelids, and she opened them.

Kalmiya already had her visor polarized as far as it could, and still the light nearly blinded her. She still could make out what was in front of her, however. And it was, if she was honest with herself, disappointing. It was merely a shining crystal atop a pedestal. "Kind of a disappointment, don't you think?" Kelly said to Kalmiya.

"Hah." Kalmiya said. "You should see this in the thermal spectrum, x-ray. This definitely ain't a boring crystal."

Halsey moved up to grab the crystal. The moment she grabbed it, though, Kalmiya grew alarmed. "Neutrino spike! Goes through the mountain roof! We need to move!"

Fred, knowing the basics of it, grabbed Halsey, and Kelly guided them all back to the walls, looking for an exit.

"Isaac, Vinh: cover our Six. Will, with me o-"

then the ceiling exploded, and Kelly looked up.

A hole melted in the roof above, the edges melting away from it. As soon as the roof was pierced, a beam went down straight to the floor. The moment it hit, the beam ended. Kelly could see fifteen meter deep hole had appeared around where the beam had hit the floor.

"What the-" Halsey started, but Jun interrupted her. "Energy projector, the same type they use to glass planets. Only the big ships have them, so they must have one up abo-"

Then the hole in the roof lit up purple, and another beam went down to the floor. This time, though, Kelly could clearly see Covenant soldiers riding it.

Lots and lots of Covenant soldiers.

"Gravity lift!" Kalmiya called. "They're filling up the mines with them."

Kelly nodded, and ran away in a straight line, directly away from the grav-lift.

The others stayed behind, covering Halsey while Kelly searched for a way out. After a moment, she noticed some of the shots coming her way were dark-purple, and were getting larger. The Covenant had likely deployed a Shade turret.

Then a patch of wall seemed to darken, and Kelly looked into it. Then she let out a sigh of relief.

A passage had opened up in the wall.

"Passage." she called. "Ground floor, dead ahead. I'll enter and clear."

Fred lighted his acknowledgement light, and Kelly went in and cleared it. The first part seemed clear, and after about one hundred and fifty meters, it went around a left-hand corner. Kelly emerged again, in time to see a large explosion in the crater that had been formed with the glassing of the facility. A pressure wave blurred her motion tracker. Kalmiya cleared it up, and half of the enemy contacts in the crater were gone.

As were Isaac's and Vinh's signals. Likely caught in the explosion.

Fred and Will stormed in, with Fred holding Halsey under one arm, like a misbehaving toddler. Kalmiya highlighted something in Halsey's hands, and Kelly noted it was in fact the crystal. Jun appeared to be holding position just outside the passage, keeping them from being overrun.

Then something appeared in the chamber Kelly really didn't want to see.

An Anti-Air Wraith. It was specialized in fighting aerial targets, but it's shots were so powerful that one wraith could easily demolish a large UNSC-base.

And it was aiming straight at them.

Kelly gestured back into the passage. "Get to cover! Now!"

They all sprinted into the passageway, and Jun took cover in the passage as well. He then took aim again, and shot at the Fuel-Rods just as they were about to enter the passageway.

He hit the front-most one, and it exploded, triggering a chain-reaction at the remaining eight shots. They all exploded, and it damaged the upper supports of the passage. It collapsed, and Jun jumped out of the way just in time to avoid falling debris.

Kelly helped him up, and he nodded. They all ran to the end of the passage, and took the corner.

And froze in their place. It was a dead-end.

"Well." Kalmiya said. "This is a total cluster-fuck."

Kelly agreed. Just outside, army of Covenant forces was waiting for them, trying to break in and kill them all. And they were in a dead-end passage.

"Yep." Kelly said. "A damn Cluster-fuck."

* * *

 **That's it for this Chapter. Please, do review this, because the short fight between Cortana and the other cruiser was my first depiction of a fight in space, at least on the scale of Capital ship to Capital Ship.**

 **Until next time**

 **Gharst Omenlumin.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Here is the next chapter. Please, enjoy.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Halo at all.**

* * *

Halo: First Strike Chapter 3

Six arrived on the bridge shortly after Fol.

They had practiced a lot against each other in fighting, even though after six hours Fol had called out a break due to the fact he had nothing new to learn. But Six had had an idea shortly after the end of the break.

She had begun to teach Fol how to _properly_ fight dirty, like kicks to sensitive body parts, grabbing an opponent's weapon out of his hand, kicking in the face real hard, etc.

Fol had demonstrated he _could_ do that a few times, but he did that a way too few amount of times. Six had merely taught him to do that more often. It was one of the few good things she had learned from insurrectionists.

Six had, after John had announced they were arriving, grabbed the armor plate Fol had given her, and attached it to her right shoulder, similar to how Emile had done to his armor. It stood out from the rest of her armor, the plate being painted a faint red with white stripes, and her armor being a dirty gray, with here and there a spatter of blood from Elites and other members of the Covenant. Plus, it was the second attachment Six had to her armor, with the only other attachment being a tacpad to contain Covenant Translation software.

But Six didn't mind. It was Emile's, and Six now had mementoes from all of her Squad members. Those from Noble-Team, anyway.

Another thing had come from the duels between her and Fol: Most of her hate, though still present, had faded a bit to the background. Six knew the hate would never truly abate. But she could now tolerate Fol a lot better, and no longer had the habit of going for her weapon every time he was in the same room as her. It greatly relieved the tension in the room.

They were, apparently except for John and Haverson in one of the trenches, the first ones to arrive.

"Where are the others?" Six asked.

"Spartans 034 and 058 are off prowling the ship, searching for other survivors of the ship's crew. They got tired of waiting, and wanted to do something interesting."

Fol nodded. "And the others?"

"Johnson, along with Stacker, Wilson and Dubbo, went to the engine room, both to guard it, and to play cards in silence. You can assume where Locklear and Polaski are off to. Rise is- ah, there he is."

Six turned, and saw that Rise was emerging from one of the Huragok passages. He was followed by a dozen of the Huragok. He turned to them, and greeted them.

( _Hello. I see the tension between the Reclaimer and the Sangheili has abated a bit with the duel._ )

John immediately turned to them. "Duel?"

Six nodded. "He agreed to teach me how to properly fight with an Energy sword."

"Not that you needed it." Cortana said from the central platform.

Six nodded. John suddenly looked a bit closer at her, and stepped over. He tapped her new shoulder plate. "Where did you get that?"

Fol answered this time. "I had it with me the entire time I travelled with you. It was from her former teammate, who I killed on Reach, back before Halo. I decided to give it to her, as a peace-offering."

Six snorted. "Like giving a knife to someone is a peace-offering."

John chuckled. "Glad to see you two aren't clawing at each other's throats anymore."

at that point the doors opened, and Johnson and the marines and ODST stepped through. Wilson, as usual, was busy antagonizing Stacker and Dubbo, with Johnson attempting to play peacekeeper.

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Dubbo said. "I told you we were going to go to Earth someday. You just have to accept it."

"But I don't want to go to New York." Wilson said. "It's too crowded."

"You don't seem to worry about that when engaging Elites." Stacker retorted.

"Oh, quit it." Johnson said. "We've arrived."

They all then looked around. Suddenly Wilson stood straighter, and he stepped towards Six. He removed his Helmet, and put it under one arm.

"Ma'am." He started, his voice surprisingly innocent. "That is a really nice knife on your shoulder. May I have it?"

Six looked at him. He really was admiring it, and wanted it. Six moved her hand into one of her pouches, and grabbed out some ammo from it.

"Please, peasant." she said. "take this ammunition, and be gone. I like my knife too much."

Wilson took it, took on a exaggerated look of disappointment, and moved off. After a second, he tossed the ammunition back to her. "Keep it." he said, his voice normal as usual. "Just so you know: as soon as you die, I'm grabbing that knife." he winked at her. Six rolled her eyes, and looked back at him. "As you said: over my dead body."

Johnson and the others laughed, and then Johnson looked back at the chief. "So, sir, how long before we arrive at Reach?"

"About fifteen minutes." Cortana said.

Wilson then then walked up the platform. He seemed... sad, or resigned. Six took interest in it.

"Cortana" Wilson asked. "As soon as we reach Reach, can you pull up live images of Manassas?"

"Sure." Cortana said. "Why?"

Wilson seemed to grow even more sad. "My daughter was there during the attack on Reach."

most of the others looked at him. "You have a daughter?" Chips asked. Wilson nodded. "Lena Wilson. Adopted her after her mother, a friend of mine, died of radiation poisoning when she was younger. Now coming up on twelve years old. We were actually on vacation on Reach when the Covenant appeared. I was off-duty for the first time in years, so we cherished it."

He then looked back at the display. "When They appeared, she was the one to convince me to help in the defense of the planet, instead of going with her to the evacuation craft. She stayed with an acquaintance of us, Sarah McGregor." Wilson paused. "I have no idea what happened to them, and whether they made it off. Manassas was the last place they stopped at, picking up others on Sarah's freighter before retreating to Earth."

the others nodded, and Six even could sympathize with him. She unsheathed the Kukri, and handed it to Wilson. He looked up at her. "I want it back when we arrive, but for now you can look at it."

Wilson nodded, and grabbed it, truly admiring it. After only a minute, however, he handed it back, hilt held to Six. "A nice knife. Where did you get it?"

"Former teammate. Even more of a psycho than you are. Fol over there took it after he killed him. Handed it back to me a few hours ago."

Wilson looked at Fol. He took on a grin. "Fol, you bastard. You took away a potential friend. Never do that again." Wilson then moved back to the central platform.

Locklear and Polaski reappeared next. They didn't seem as disheveled this time, though they glance at each other.

Stacker nodded at them, and glanced at Wilson. He was to focused on the displays, though, so Stacker left him alone.

Sam and Linda arrived two minutes before they were scheduled to emerge, and Six saw they'd been busy. Sam's minigun was still glowing from a lot of continuous fire, and the barrel of Linda's rifle was still smoking a bit. Six nodded at them, and they approached the platform. Sam set his minigun down, and took position at one of the consoles. Linda took out her rifle, removed her helmet, and blew away the smoke. She put her helmet back on, and moved to stand with the Chief.

"Exiting in five, four, three, two..." Cortana said, and after a moment, they reappeared.

And Reach was a cinder. There was fire everywhere, and over most of the planet, there was either a burning orange, or a cooling brown/black of obsidian. Wilson moved over, and Cortana, after two seconds, zoomed in on a particular section of the planet.

There was fire everywhere, and Six had to look really hard in order to make out the burning skyscrapers of the city. Wilson swallowed real hard.

"Cortana" Six asked. "Any tracking satellites still active? Any with recordings of air traffic in this region?"

"N- wait. A single satellite operational. It shows a freighter leaving the area of Manassas, headed for Aszod, hoping to hide under the cover of the _Autumn_ , and jump as they left the atmosphere."

Cortana paused. "The freighter was hit underway by AA fire, and crashed near Menachite mountain."

Wilson nodded, and replaced his helmet. Six noted he had an odd skull painted on the top of his helmet.

After a while, Cortana started zooming back out, but Fol stopped her. "Wait. Zoom in again, northeastern part, to the right of the three corvettes escorted by a cruiser. Closer to that mountain."

Cortana complied, and she zoomed in again.

There was a region where an assault carrier and two destroyers were hovering over Menachite mountain, with an army of Covenant camped around it they had dug out a large section of the eastern side of the mountain.

The mountain, and a ten-kilometer radius around it, wasn't glassed. Fol looked closer at it.

"There's only one reason they wouldn't glass the entire planet if they knew humans inhabited it." Fol said. "Forerunner artifacts. Of the same species that built Halo. It warrants investigation."

Haverson nodded. "Anything more specific you can tell us?"

"Only that it's a large one." Fol said. "Otherwise they wouldn't have left such a large portion of the planet intact."

Six looked again. _If the land, which was close to the orbital generators, was unglassed..._

"Cortana, open all UNSC channel, prioritize receiving signals." Six told her.

"Why? There is no chance that anyo-"

"Just do it." Six insisted.

Cortana sighed, but complied, and put open all channels. And sure enough, there was something. It wasn't a message or anything important to the others, but a tune.

A tune all Spartans, whether II or III, knew, and only used upon giving an all-clear.

Oly Oly Oxen Free.

Six turned to the others, the first one of the Spartans to leave the stupor.

"Wilson, you fly our Spirit. Haverson, you are to remain here, in charge of Johnson, Stacker, Locklear, Dubbo and Polaski. Rise, you stay here with the other Huragok. Stand by to make a rendezvous point. Wait for us. Cortana, analyze the Covenant patrols. Determine a weak point, and converse with Haverson about meeting us there. Everyone else, with me. We're going down there."

Haverson looked dubious, as did Cortana, but Johnson and Wilson nodded, and went on with their respective tasks. Six then looked at the Chief and the others, and knew they thought the same.

 _There are still a few of us down there. And we're going to get them out._

* * *

John prepped his assault rifle as they headed for the surface of the planet.

They had picked up the signal from the planet, and had left in about ten minutes. They had loaded the Spirit with as much weaponry as they could carry, and had moved some plating from the Longsword to the Spirit, to give it some more armor. And, with a now more skilled Wilson piloting it.

John had set a course for the region it was emanating from. He himself was armed with an Assault Rifle and a Shotgun. Sam had his (now usual) combination of Rocket Launcher and Minigun with him, and was sitting in the gunner's seat of the Spirit. Linda had her Sniper Rifle with her, and had added an Assault Rifle to the mix for good measure. Six had her Carbine, a Shotgun, and two Energy Swords. Fol had his Fuel-Rod Gun, a DMR he traded with Stacker for his Assault Rifle, and two Energy Swords. Wilson had taken John's Plasma Repeater, and had a shotgun across his back for more close range fighting.

John fidgeted. He didn't know who was still alive, but somewhere, he hoped Kelly was among them. The only ones who knew about... he didn't know what to exactly call it, but he knew that he cared a lot about her, even more than about Sam. Sam had already guessed it, and had said so aboard the _Autumn_. He had told him that as long as John made the most of it, he was actually happy for him.

But that didn't stop him worrying about her right now.

"Hey, Chief!" Wilson called from the cockpit, pulling the Chief out of his thoughts.

"What is that tone to you guys anyway? Just so I know how to respond once we get there."

"All you'll get, Wilson," Six said "is that it's a Spartan signal. But we are coming up on the region, so call out your signal."

John nodded, and moved to the com console. He then keyed the mike, and said the proper response to the tune. "Oly Oly Oxen Free. All out in the Free, we're all free."

the signal immediately stopped transmitting. The Chief looked at the console, and Wilson nodded. "Well, color me impressed. They're out there, alive. Or they couldn't have stopped the signal immediately."

Linda looked at one of the screens, apparently the sensor. "Let's set down here. It's a short hop to where the signal came from."

"Agreed." he said. "Corporal, set us down. And do mind the paint job. I don't want to lose our good-driver discount, and the fact Six already lost hers is bad enough."

Wilson laughed. "Don't worry. I'm not gonna let myself be beaten by a swabbie."

he then set down the dropship, and Sam jumped out with him. Fol moved to get up from his seat as well, but John motioned for him to sit down. "Wait here. Your defection isn't widespread yet, so some of our own might shoot you on sight."

Fol nodded. "Of course, Chief."

Wilson then closed the hatches, and John and Sam moved out. They had barely made two steps, though, before an unknown contact appeared in their motion tracker. John halted, and aimed his Assault Rifle at the location. It was just around the boulder.

A private com opened to the Chief's helmet. "Master Chief, relax. It's me." A Spartan moved around the corner, and John and Sam both relaxed. Another of their own had survived. He looked like he had gone through Hell as well, though he looked visibly happier now that the Chief was here. Sam dropped his minigun, and stepped over to the Spartan, taking him into a bearhug. And since Sam was taller than any other Spartan, it was easy.

"Anton! Still trying to come to terms with the fact you _aren't_ the best scout in history?"

Anton laughed. "The same way you are still competing with Grace about who can make the biggest bang. Damn, where've you guys been?"

"Long story." John said. "But hold your fire on any Field-Marshals. We actually got one to _defect_."

Anton stepped back. "You aren't kidding?"

"Anton, the bastard actually saved the Chief multiple times. He's good."

Anton nodded. "Alright. Let's get into cover. I've got a few people who are very happy to see you guys."

John nodded. He hit the Com. "Linda, set down. Our little Anton's here."

"Anton!" Linda called. "No time no see. Got that pizza you promised at Cote D'Azur?"

Anton did a Spartan Smile to Sam, and said. "Gee, Linda. I'm sorry. We prepared it, but I just got so hungry and ate it."

"It's alright. I'll feed you rations for that. Almost as good as eating that pizza."

Anton visibly trembled. "I'd rather starve."

"I know. See you soon."

Anton guided them to a small alcove, and John and Sam followed him in. After a moment, he could make out Li and Grace, who were manning two turrets mounted on two boulders. John flashed each of them a Spartan smile, which both returned. Grace emerged from her turret, and gave Sam a handshake, before hitting him in the stomach. Sam mockingly reeled over, before returning the favor.

John shook his head. Sam and Grace had always had a rivalry when both discovered they liked big bangs, and had since always competed wherever they could in making big explosions. He made sure the Rocket-launcher was safe on Sam's back, and then followed Anton on inside. Sam and Grace followed him

Inside,it was rather cozy. There were a few folding chairs, and a fold-out table. On the table was a map of the region, and various markers were spread across it. There was a curtain at the back of the room, hiding something.

It was who stood behind the table, however, that drew John's attention.

Vice Admiral Danforth Whitcomb.

He and Sam snapped to attention, and gave salutes. "Admiral, Sir."

the admiral looked up from the tabled, and looked at them. He visibly relieved. "At ease, Son. Welcome to camp independence. Accommodations ain't four-star, but we call it home."

"Thank you, Sir. Be advised, we have an Elite Field-Marshal with us. He's defected to our side sir, so don't open fire."

Whitcomb frowned, but he nodded. "I don't like it, but I trust your judgement. Bring him in."

John nodded, and called ahead. "Fol, come on over. The others won't shoot you. Not yet, at least."

"Like I don't have Six here to worry about as it is." he answered.

Then, as John heard Fol click off, he saw the curtain open. A woman stepped out. She wore a tanktop with a jacket, with jeans that had a lot of pockets. She wore gloves, and had shin-high boots. She had light skin, brown eyes and short brown hair, which was tied over in a bandana. He noted she also wore an utility belt, which had several pistol clips in it. She also had a pistol holstered to her thigh.

She saluted the moment she saw the Chief. "Master Chief, Sir."

John returned the salute. "At ease. How did you know me?"

she pointed at his chest. "A friend of mine showed an interest in you, and claimed your number was 117. And that number's on your chest-plate, in Braille."

John nodded. So this woman was quite the observer.

The admiral then pulled up another chair, and the woman sat down on it. "So don't take this the wrong way, Chief, but what the hell are you doing here? Keyes had orders to take you on a mission deep into Covenant territory."

Sam spoke this time. "It's a long story, sir. Do you have the time?"

Whitcomb gestured around him. "Where are we supposed to go? Your arrival has been the most interesting thing in over two days."

John nodded. He sat down on a rock, and recounted the story, starting at his mission to recover the Nav-database from Gamma-Station, the addition of Six, the departure from Reach and the discovery of Halo and the monitor, 343 Guilty Spark. He hesitated about telling about the Flood, but Six, who had joined up with them at that moment took over. She recounted her experience with the Flood, their mission to the wreck of the Autumn, adding Fol's defection along the way, detailing Halo's destruction. Fol took over, and finished with the takeover of the _Ascendant Justice_.

The admiral finally whistled, and was about to say something, when Wilson finally arrived from securing the dropship.

And jumped up in happiness. The woman did so as well.

"Sarah!" he said, and moved over to her, ignoring the admiral. The woman stood up, and gave him a hug. "Richie, you stubborn bastard! Is that story they've been telling true?"

Wilson took off his helmet, and smiled. "Yes. Unless they said I've been a nice person."

Sarah laughed. "No, they didn't say that. But there's someone here who'd like to see you."

Sarah stood up, and shoved aside the curtain.

Beyond there was a small alcove, where most of their weapons lay.

And on one of the crates, an eleven year old girl lay asleep. She was dressed similarly to Sarah, with jeans, a top, and a jacket. She, like Wilson, had knuckle dusters on her hands, and chains hanging from her jeans. She had blue eyes, platinum blonde hair, and had a look in her eyes that reminded John a lot of Wilson. Wilson froze up, and he then moved over to the girl, but the girl suddenly jumped up, and ran over to him.

"Dad!" she called.

And Wilson actually crouched down, and hugged her.

And only then John understood. This were Lena Wilson and Sarah McGregor, Wilson's daughter and acquaintance respectively. The ones he thought were dead. John felt suddenly a lot more happy for Wilson.

"Need some privacy?" Six asked from the camp's entrance. Wilson just sat there with his daughter. John saw he actually took his helmet off for her. He visibly looked relieved, and was on the border of actually jumping up in joy.

"No, thank you." Wilson said after a minute. He then turned to the Admiral, who was smiling. "Go on, Admiral. I'm still listening in over the com, even if I'm a little... distracted."

Whitcomb nodded. He didn't seem to mind it that much that he was ignored by Wilson for the moment. "Well, in short, I believe you all, even if there is something that isn't adding up at the moment. I can't put my finger on it, though, so disregard it for the moment."

everyone nodded.

"Excuse me, sir," Linda said, "But how is it you are still alive, and here of all places?"

Whitcomb sat down again, and took on a smile. "Well, that's another long story. I'll give you the short and sweet version." he leaned back in the chair. "As as those Covenant bastards showed up in the system, shortly after UPPERCUT, I knew Reach was history. Fol, you know most of the Covenant don't do anything half ways. While everyone else evacuated, I stayed behind, helping a science team creating a new bomb for us."

Fol immediately sat straighter. Whitcomb noticed, and looked at him. "Know anything about this, Katarn?"

"That depends." Fol answered. "Is it called a NOVA?"

Whitcomb nodded, and Fol immediately slumped. "I only heard rumors that it was being developed, but never thought it would already be in this stage."

"Well, Fol, your intel's a bit out of date."

Sam raised his hand. "Sir, I'll admit I'm the ignorant one at the moment."

"At all moments." Li called over the com's, and most Spartans snickered.

"But I _don't_ know what a NOVA is," Sam continued, ignoring Li's comment. "so could you please enlighten me?"

The admiral grabbed a paper file from underneath the map, and laid it out on the table. "It's a cluster of nukes, each with a Lithium Triteride casing. Now, these bombs, in theory, when they detonate, not only make an incredibly big bang like you expect a nuke to, but they also force their Lithium Triteride casings together in one superheated and pressurized center." the admiral took on a grin, and John noticed Sam was paying very close attention to the admiral. "Boosting the yield a hundredfold."

Sam immediately looked at John. "Scratch the minigun. I want a NOVA for Christmas. They're planet killers."

"No, you don't." Grace said before John could answer. "I already ordered them all for thanksgiving."

"I thought you didn't get presents for Thanksgiving, but that you had to buy them yourself in a mad rush, along with hundreds of others."

"That's Black Friday." Sarah said, with a grin on her face. "Profiting day for Freighter pilots like me, for stores pay triple the usual amount on those days."

the admiral coughed discreetly, and everyone paid closer attention again. "Sadly, we got caught flat-footed with those things on the surface, so I decided to repurpose them."

Six nodded, and spoke up. "With all these Covenant around, I'd guess you put them on a timer, give or take two weeks, and set them to blow after that. Then two things happen: They blow over Reach, as they are still in the system, and stop the fleet currently here. Or the Covenant take them to one of their homeworlds, as they attempt to study it." Six then took on a gleeful tone. "Oh, it would be the new national barbeque day."

Whitcomb started grinning again. "That's right, but I've given it about ten days instead of two weeks. Don't give them too much time to tinker with the things, after all."

"And how long ago was this, Admiral?" Fol asked. John noted he had a look of fear on his face. "Oh, we've got twenty hours left. Don't worry, ONI'll get to skin you."

"They have to get in line, Admiral. I got him first." Six said.

Whitcomb looked at Six, then at the Master Chief, and back. "Are you that crazy, Chief, traveling with the most Psychopathic Spartan I've ever met?"

John chuckled. "Be glad, Admiral. This is one of her more quiet days."

"Just wait until she's on her period." Linda joked. Only Sam, John and Fol laughed, though.

Whitcomb shook his head once, before continuing. "There was just a slight problem. I had a team of Marines, Charlie company, that got wiped out before we could get to the NOVA bombs." Whitcomb took on a sad look. "Brave kids. A damn waste of good men. That's when I picked up Red team, and I 'convinced' them to lend me a few of your Spartans. We got to the bombs, armed them, and have been raising eight kinds of Hell down here, with hit-and-run exercises."

He then looked at Richie and Lena, who were catching up in their own way. He then gestured to Sarah. "That's when I picked them up. Their Freighter had crashed, and I just couldn't leave them. We recovered them alive from the transport, and then bugged out." he took on a resigned tone again. "By the time we got there, there were no other survivors."

"Crash killed most of the others, and the rest got killed from breathing in toxins from a ruptured fuel tank. I got Lena out, and as I went back to the transport, it went up in the sky, blown to pieces smaller than Lena. It attracted the admiral, and we've been running with them ever since."

the admiral nodded. "That's about the size of it. We spotted a large concentration of Covenant forces on Menachite mountain, but we can't get close enough to see what they're up to."

John nodded. "And the rest of Red-Team?"

"We got one last transmission from them before they said they were falling back." Whitcomb moved the map John saw earlier on top again. "Right in the current center of Covenant activity. Near the ruins of CASTLE base, but the Covenant had a lot of digging equipment down there. Chief, I'll be honest and say I don't know if anyone could survive down there. What do you think?"

"The tunnels." Sam said, and the admiral turned to him.

"The base is built over an old Titanium mine," Sam elaborated. "and it had been an expansive mining operation back then. We know, because we spent quite some time down there training. The Covenant can only put in so many search parties down there."

"You think they have a chance?"

"Admiral." Fol said. "If I know any team that could survive down there, it's a Spartan team. They're down there, alive."

the admiral looked at Fol for a second, and then nodded. "Well, you people got here in a dropship, right? Then let's go get them."

"Excuse me, sir" Sarah said. "But, given all the info you guys seem to have, shouldn't we get back to earth?"

"You're right." The admiral said. "But I am not leaving a single soldier behind if I can help it, and that goes double for a Spartan. We're going in."

* * *

Cortana listened from the Epsilon Eridani Oort Cloud, as they recovered from their close encounter.

Minutes after the Spartans had left the ship and entered the atmosphere, the Covenant AI in the ship's system had, in a matter of speaking, stunned Cortana for a moment, before taking over the Ship's Com systems. It had warned the Covenant Fleet over Reach of Ascendant Justice's true allegiance, and was about to transmit Cortana's calculations on jumping in-atmosphere, when she regained control, and had copied all of it's data, before deleting it. As much as it would be a treasure for ONI to have a Covenant AI, it was too dangerous to keep it operational. She had, seconds after doing so, with the help of Tends to Rise's Huragok friends, upgraded the Ship's cannons and energy projectors. Now the ship could fire a continuous laser at Covenant ships from her turrets, and the Energy projectors had a lot less of recharge time on their hands, and Cortana could regenerate Plasma at an astonishing rate.

And now, while Rise and his buddies were busy upgrading the shields, giving them a lot more muscle. All this happened while she reexamined the data she recovered from stray communications a thousand times, and still came up with the same answer.

The Covenant, after making a few more stops for rearming, were on their way to Earth, in a fleet consisting of about Three hundred ships at the moment. And the amount of ships was still rising.

She then turned to Haverson, who was currently sitting with the others, combat ready while they were still hours away from the rendezvous. She displayed her avatar from one of the consoles in the trench they were sitting in, and addressed the lieutenant. "Haverson, I'm about to jump back to Reach. Want to see the show?"

"Is that wise?" he asked as he turned around. "They know we ain't one of their own now. They'll be ready for us the moment we enter the system."

"And the Chief and his team are still down there, so we are going back anyway. Besides, I am planning something... _unique_."

"Define unique." Johnson said, as he got up as well.

"Oh, I don't know. Is docking a suitable UNSC frigate to our dorsal side unique enough for you?"

the others all turned around, and Stacker stood back up from his sitting position. "I find that unique enough. LT, what do you think?"

Haverson tapped his chin twice, before he nodded.

"Hit it, Cortana."

* * *

Fol prepared himself as they all flew down the mountain.

They had all loaded onto the Dropship, Whitcomb, The Chief, Sam, Linda, Li, Grace, Anton, Six, Fol, Wilson, Sarah and Lena, and had it cramped a bit with their numbers at the moment, and most of the Spartans sat to make more space wile they were flying and preparing. Fol currently sat in the right prong, letting Wilson fly the Spirit, while Whitcomb himself currently sat in the gunner's seat.

Thanks to him, as he could fake Sangheili accents really well, the Carrier and Cruisers didn't bother them, and they were currently flying unhindered through the tunnel, into the chamber they understood was underneath.

And it was really large. The room was three kilometers across, and five hundred meters high. It had twelve balconies, all stacked over one another. There was a small pile of rubble at one end of the room, and the Covenant soldiers were trying to clear it, letting an AA Wraith blast away at it. Fol opened his Com to the others.

"Chief, there's an AA-Wraith blasting away at a pile of Rubble. Your team members might be behind it."

"alright." the Chief said. "Let's ruin that party. Wilson, drop us down, and leave as soon as we are all off. Lena, Li, you stay here with him."

"Aww. Why me?"

"Because of eenie meenie miney moe, and you're it. Just so we have someone to cover our escape."

"Yes, Chief." Li said, resigned.

Fol then looked around. There were so few Covenant on the surface, yet they had all intercepted reports that an entire battalion had gone down there. _Where were they?_

Then they arrived, and Wilson announced in an unusually cheery voice. "This is your stop, ladies and Gentlemen. Try to get a few souvenirs back for me, will you? I want to give Lena a pre- Lena, get out of there. It's dangerous in there."

"What's dangerous about sitting in the Gunner's seat? I know the basic's of shooting things, thanks to you."

"Do you also know how to do so with Covenant weapons."

a short pause, as Fol jumped out alongside Grace, Sam, Six, and Sarah. The admiral, The Chief, Linda and Anton jumped out the other side.

"No. Not yet, anyway. Can I at least look?"

"I swear, You are just as crazy as your mother."

Fol then ignored the rest of the conversation, as he was coming up on the main group of Covenant soldiers, a cluster of Elites guarding the back of the AA Wraith. Six then opened the com. "Draw the attention of the Wraith. I've got an idea."

Fol nodded at her, and pulled up his Fuel-Rod gun. He fired at a group of Elites a little beside the Wraith. Three of them went down from a single shot, and the fourth had his shields drained. Before he could grab his DMR, though, the fourth was shot in the head by Sarah, who stood next to him. She picked off the grunts in the area, and, Fol noted, she had near perfect aim. All if them were hit in the head with a single bullet, except for one, whose Methane mask got in the way. She shot it in the head immediately afterwards.

Their attack, of course, made the Wraith turned around, aiming it's two adapted Fuel-Rod guns at them.

And Six immediately jumped on top of it, and shot the gunner in the head with her Carbine. She then holstered it, and knocked on the hatch.

The fool, whoever was manning it, opened the hatch, and Six immediately stabbed the elite in the side of it's head with her new Kukri. She pulled the elite's body out, dumped him to the side, and went in herself. She closed the hatch, and moved the Wraith over to the rest of her team.

Six had successfully hijacked an Anti-Air Wraith. John whistled. "Nice job. Just don't lend it to Sam. Or Grace."

"Hey." Grace said.

"awww, come on." Sam whined. "I want a ride in that thing."

"And how much property damage would you cause in the meantime?" Six asked. "It's mine. Steal your own. Ohhh, it has Lock-on. And auto-reload. Hey, and it has a high rate of fire, too."

Sam visibly groaned, with each new feature Six revealed.

Fol then turned to the rest of the Covenant soldiers, about fifteen in total. He and Sam opened up with their Rocket Launchers, with Sam temporarily lending his Minigun to Anton, who also opened fire. The fight was over in about fifteen seconds. And that included Sarah going across all of the corpses, and shooting each in the head once.

Fol saw something glittering in a crater in the chamber, likely made by an Energy Projector. He moved over to it, and immediately stepped back.

It was the helmet of a Spartan, with the number 039 written on it on the back, in the writing the humans had for their blind people.

"Spartan!" he called. "Over here!"

After a moment, one of the Spartans moved to him, Grace he noted. He pointed at the helmet, and she immediately moved over to it. She looked at it for a moment, before putting it back down. They moved to rejoin the others. They were busy making an opening in the rubble, and after a moment, Fol saw something poke out of it.

The barrel of a Sniper Rifle.

The others hurried their digging, and after a moment, something punched through the rubble, making a hole large enough to step through.

And Fol's blood ran cold.

It was one of the Spartans he had hunted earlier this month. One of Noble-Team, the third, he noted. And the Spartan looked at him, and raised his rifle. Linda pushed it back down though, and they seemed to be conversing. Satisfied he was safe for the moment, he turned to look around again.

Something was still bothering him, namely the fact that they had had so little opposition, despite the reports that an entire army was entrenched here. He looked around again. He noted Six was suddenly aiming upwards, and he looked at the balconies as well.

And his blood ran even colder than a few seconds ago. So that's why he hadn't spotted them: he had been too busy with the ground floor to properly inspect the balconies.

"Wilson. Quick question." Fol said. "What was that gesture some of your religious people make? The cross-shaped gesture."

"The way I remember it, it's this: Forehead, lower chest, upper left chest, upper right chest, kiss the hand that made the gesture. All with the same hand. Why?"

Fol did as Wilson described the gesture, though the kiss was more a tap to the helmet. "Because you'd better get down here _now_. And whatever you do, don't look at the balconies."

"Sure." Wilson said, before signing off. After a minute he called again. "Fol, remember when you said don't look at the balconies?"

"Yeah?"

"I looked. And how the hell can Grunts sit so still?" his comment was made in jest, but Fol could hear the edge in his voice. "I don't know how. I would ask them myself, but you know what reaction that could bring. Just get here."

Fol then heard a roar, and turned to look.

Two hunters had fired Fuel-Rods.

Pain was all Fol felt next, and he fell.

* * *

They just stood there, in a solid formation.

Jun was at the rear of the corridor, aiming his Sniper rifle at the pile of rubble, with Halsey behind him. He formed her last defense. Fred was next in the formation, his Spartan Laser aimed at the same pile. Fred had the SMG's, one of which was silenced, holstered to his thighs. Will came next, with the Rocket Launcher he saw in the Armory back at CASTLE base. He had two of the new prototype pistols holstered, and had a grenade ready to throw in his other hand. Kelly stood at the front, with her new Shotgun out front, and new Battle Rifle, as it had been called, attached to her back.

Kalmiya was silent for now, ready to purge herself of any useful data if Kelly would fall. The Covenant had been blasting away at the pile of rubble for half an hour, and with each hit kelly assumed it would be the last, and that the round after that would kill her. They had nowhere to take cover behind except a corner. But that merely backed them into a corner. One even John wouldn't have escaped from. There was even a bit of light coming through the rubble, indicating it was about to collapse. She was about to resign herself entirely to this faith, when the blasting lowered in volume. Not that it stopped, but more like... _it turned into another direction_?

Kelly called it over. "The rumbling's moving on. Still going, but seemingly no longer in our direction."

"Jun." Fred called. "look through that hole. See if you can see what's going on."

Jun moved up, and replaced Kelly at the front. He detached the scope of his rifle, aimed it at the hole, and looked. After two seconds he lowered it. "The Covenant seem to be taken care off. No elites visible at a-"

then they heard something they didn't expect to hear.

Whitcomb's voice, telling others to start digging.

Jun immediately moved to the hole, and used his rifle as a pitchfork, poking at the hole. After a few times of trying, he punched through, and the rifle poked out.

Another voice, male, called for the others to start digging harder. Jun took a step back, and then jumped into the pile of rubble. He punched at it, and the pile fell down to the sides. Kelly stepped through after a second.

And saw a strange sight. Whitcomb was standing next to the pile, looking at the hole, and who stepped out. There were other spartans, including Anton and...

Linda. She was pushing Jun's barrel down, indicating someone wasn't meant to be fired on. But with her being here, and alive at that, then that meant John ha-

And then she saw him, while he was currently talking with Sam about something. The AA Wraith was currently hovering behind them, and since Sam was relaxed about it, she assumed it was driven by another Spartan.

 _But John was here._

Remembering the others, she stepped aside, and after a moment, Fred and Will stepped out. Fred seemed to be as surprised as she was.

"Anton... Sam... John?" he said disbelievingly. Sam stepped forward, and gave Fred a light punch in the shoulder. "Yes, the cavalry has arrived. I'd like to explain, but I have to introduce you to someone to introduce you to."

"I'll bet." Kelly said. Then Kalmiya spoke up, though it was on a private channel. "So, who's the future ms. Kelly?"

"What?"

"Oh, come on. Your pulse has elevated ever since you emerged from the rubble. Your breathing has quickened slightly. You are rising in temperature. All symptoms of affection. You can't hide something like that from someone who _technically_ is you."

This would take some getting used to. "I'll tell you later." she then refocused on the others. Halsey had finally come out of the hole, and she was greeting John and the admiral. Kelly moved to join Sam...

and saw why Jun had raised his rifle. An Elite Field-Marshal was walking towards them, flanked by Grace and a civilian Kelly hadn't seen before. She saw the Elite's gaze move between them as he joined the group. Sam stopped next to her.

"Yep. I've got an Elite buddy. Don't worry, his defection's legitimate. He even saved John a few times, and risking his own life to do so at that."

So the Elite had joined them now? Kelly made a point to talk to it later. She then turned to Sam. "You said you wanted to introduce us to someone. Care to introduce us?"

Sam nodded. "She's driving the tank at the moment. She's nice... as long as you can get past the combination of my humor, Grace's taste for explosions, Allison's taste for fires, and John's stubbornness."

"Sounds like your type." Kelly joked. Sam nodded. She noted it had moved on to a private channel. "I admit I like her. But don't let Linda or John hear that. They've been bugging me about it forever."

Kelly nodded, and moved to the Wraith.

And tensed, as the Wraith suddenly aimed upwards, across the balconies. Kelly followed where it was aiming at...

and her heart stopped for a second. There were a lot of Covenant on the balconie- no, scratch that. They were crowding the bloody things. And there were thousands of them... on every level.

 _During their half-hour entrapment, the Covenant had loaded a damn battalion into the mountain._

"Goddamn." she heard someone say. It sounded muffled, likely coming from the tank. "That's a lot of targets."

Then two Hunters on the third balcony roared, and fired their Fuel-Rod Cannons at them. Kelly jumped up to take the shot. And was thrown aside by an unknown force just as they nearly hit her. She hit the ground, and looked.

And the Elite Field-Marshal Jun had aimed at was there, jumping in front of both shots, and taking them both in the chest. He fell down, his armor smoking.

Kelly was incredibly surprised, to say the least. An Elite taking the blow, that could have easily killed them, for them? And risking his own life to do so? That was something Kelly would never forget. He had also earned her respect. No wonder Sam trusted it. No, _him_.

Then he shocked her again, and got up. He was coughing up blood, and his skin was smoking, his shields flickering from the damage to their systems. But he was alive, and even standing upright.

He then turned to the other Covenant forces, and Kelly saw him attempting to stand tall. He didn't entirely succeed, for he leaned on one leg more than the other, but he still stood. Then he spoke, as the majority of Covenant forces were starting to aim at the _Hunters_. He then activated some kind of speaker, likely in his Helmet. He started speaking.

"Members of the Covenant!" He began, yelling in order to be heard. "You are all fools, idiots, and worse, ignorant of the truth! You claim to be the rightful Successors to the Forerunners, and that it is _your_ destiny to begin the Great Journey! Yet you ignore the fact that Humans can activate Forerunner artifacts, and we can't! You ignore the fact that Humans discovered a Halo before us, while we have studied the Forerunners for millennia! You ignore the fact that Humans could even take the Crystal, and keep it out of your hands this long! You claim to be the _inheritors_? I SPIT on you all, who claim to have the right to exterminate a species purely because only _one_ being deemed it so! I am Fol Katarn, and if this is what the Covenant has descended to, then I would rather die alongside a thousand Demons before I would call one of you an ally again!" Fol paused as he spat out some blood, and he raised his Fuel-Rod gun. "Now, Who's first?!"

The Covenant soldiers were shocked, Kelly could tell. They all just stood there, looking down at them. And Kelly could tell most of the others were shocked as well. Only Sam, Linda and John didn't seem as shocked, though they did share a look of surprise between each other.

Then the AA-Wraith moved over to their group, and fired at the balconies on the first floor, taking advantage of the Covenant's temporary ceasefire. Nine shots came from the tank, and Kelly saw a lot of Covenant soldiers vaporize with each strike. Kelly ran up to the tank, and jumped into its gunners seat, aiming the plasma turret at the Covenant above.

The Covenant, despite being torn apart by the fire of the tank, never moved or open fire. Then a group of Elites threw down lines to the bottom floor, and they started to rappel down.

The tank Kelly sat in suddenly sped forward, and moved over to the elites. Kelly was about to ask the Spartan driving it what she was doing, when she realized it herself.

Those Elites were excellent targets to ram. Kelly smiled, and fired at the elites. She shot two down before they hit the ground, and the others turned to attack her.

And were splattered by the tank as it ran them over. There was nothing left as it finally moved back, and Kelly saw a lot of blood was sprayed over the front of the tank.

They had no rest, however, as the Covenant started to send more of them down. The Driver of her tank fired at the Balcony above them, and Kelly wondered why.

And smiled, as the driver hit the hooks of the rappel lines of the enemy soldiers, and they all fell towards their deaths, either dying because of the fall or because Kelly finished them off with her Plasma turret.

Then a Spirit dropped in from above, and Kelly turned to it. But she saw Sam and the others running towards it, and knocked on the Pilot's hatch. "Spartan, the others are leaving. We need to go."

"Alright." a female voice sounded from the hatch. "You jump out. I'm covering you from this beauty."

"You're not coming with us?"

"I am, but I'm staying in this thing. A Spirit can carry this Wraith with ease. I'll be fine."

Kelly nodded, and she jumped out, sprinting for the Spirit. She noted Kalmiya, who did so without Kelly's prompting, was amplifying her speed and reaction times. Kelly started to appreciate the AI more and more.

Then she actually got there, second last with only Anton covering them with a Warthog's minigun. She wondered if it was his, or if Sam was borrowing his own to him. Then the hatch of the dropship closed, and Kelly moved to the Cockpit.

She was pleased to see Li there as well, standing beside an ODST, who was piloting the dropship. Sitting in the gunner's seat, however, was an eleven year old girl. She was intensely studying the controls, like she wanted to learn how to use it. Kelly left her to it.

Instead, she looked out of the Holographic displays, making sure the Tank was attached to the Spirit, as the Driver claimed it could be.

After about half a minute of repelling Covenant soldiers from the dropship, it finally managed to pick up the tank. They finally headed up the hole.

And promptly met resistance. The dropship was being pushed back into the hole.

"The Grav-lift." Kalmiya said. "It's being used to push us back in."

"Step aside." the Elite said, as he picked up a Fuel-Rod gun. "I'll shoot it down."

"You won't be able to hit it at this distance. The beam will push the rods back." John said.

"I've got to try. It's our only way out of here."

Kelly then pushed him back to the floor. "No, _someone's_ got to try. You need to cool back off, and lick your wounds. Or you might die on us from internal injuries."

the Elite seemed like he was about to argue the point, but handed the gun over to her after a moment. "Give it your best sho-"

but at that moment, the Dropship shot forward again, and Fol fell down on the floor. Everyone else, excepr the ODST and the girl, stumbled.

"Hey, we're going again!" the pilot called out. "Next stop: _Ascendant Justice_ , vacation with my little girl, and a good rest on a beach."

Kelly nodded, and moved to the prongs to ensure everyone was alright.

Halsey was sitting on one of the seats of the dropship, despite the fact the seat wasn't built with her anatomy in mind. She was observing the Crystal, which had seemingly changed shape. Then Kelly paid closer attention to it, as it started to shift again. It's parts flew around a glowing center for a moment, before settling for it's original shape. How odd.

"Kalmiya." Halsey said. "If you have recorded that, could you transmit it to my datapad?"

"Done, Doctor."

Halsey nodded, and checked the readings on her datapad. Kelly, no longer interested in the crystal, moved back to the cockpit to join the others. She ended up back in the cockpit, and looked at the display again. The driver of the tank was sweeping the tank's guns up and down, doing her part to keep the Covenant off their backs.

And it paid off. As two Seraph fighters tried to block them and slow them down, the driver fired at the center. One fighter immediately exploded from four of the blasts, and the other tried to evade. But two shots still hit and it veered to the side, smoking plasma from it's side and engine. Kelly nodded, pleased.

She frowned, however, when she noticed that there were a lot of ships in orbit, and they were all going for them.

"Kalmiya, how many ships a-" Kelly started to ask, but Kalmiya interrupted her.

"I count about thirty-nine ships in orbit around the planet, and about fifteen will exit in about three minutes. All of which are gunning for us at the moment."

"Any way to escape them?"

"Unless we get a SlipSpace capable-vessel, smaller than an ant. You think they'll stop pursuing us if we ask nicely?"

"Asking isn't our strong suit, Kalmiya. Besides, I always loved a good fight."

"Must be why you cling to the crazy ones."

"Who are you talking to?" Sam asked, as he stepped over to her. John was currently busy with Whitcomb, assessing their situation.

"Kalmiya, the AI of CASTLE base, and Halsey's assistant. I'm carrying her at the moment."

"Must be annoying, having another voice in your head."

at that point, the driver of the tank called over on their com. "I wouldn't mind it. I've already got a dozen voices in my head. I can do with some diversity."

Sam looked forward. "Six, I wasn't talking to you. Go back to keeping those voices in line."

"Too late. It's the reason I'm in the tank, so I won't frighten you all to death."

Kelly laughed. "I'm harder to frighten than that. Try me."

"Alright. What has four legs at the beginning of it's life, has two in it's later age, and has three when it turns into a geriatric?"

Kelly thought for a moment. "A human. It starts on arms and legs, then gets up and walks on two, and later uses a crutch as a third."

the tank driver, seemingly called Six, laughed. "That's the classical answer. But here's my version. It starts on four, and later in it's life it's legs are cut off. Later, I hand one of the legs back to it as a crutch. Scared enough?"

Kelly looked forward. "Did ONI pick you up from the Psychiatric ward?"

"The one for the criminally insane."

Kelly laughed. "Well, I'm safe. I'm the fastest Spartan alive. I can outrun you."

The driver laughed back. "Well, I'll just steal a Saber, and gun you down from the sky."

"It's a deal if I go insane."  
"Oh, if that happens, I will join you in running. I like crazy people."

Sam looked at Kelly, then at the tank. "You two haven't even seen each other yet, and already you are ganging up on the rest of us."

"Oh, don't worry." Six said. "We'll get to you shortly."

At that moment, Kelly looked outside, and saw an odd combination.

It was a Covenant Carrier, but it had a UNSC Frigate on it's back, piggy-riding it. On the side, Kelly could read the word Gettysburg written on the side. A human opened the com channel, and shouted. "Choo, Choo! The train is leaving. Get aboard, and get free ice-cream."

"Johnson, what did you steal this time?" Six said over the channel. "If I get aboard and all I'll find is silverware, you're in big trouble."

"Six, don't worry. We've got some silver to bribe you with."

"You know Silver isn't the stuff I can be bribed with."

"How about Rise? He might want to join you on your crazy missions."

"No, thanks. Although, he _can_ take care of the AA-Wraith I'm bringing back."

Johnson was silent after that. "Where the Hell did you get an AA Wraith."

Kelly ignored the rest of their conversation. She turned to Whitcomb, who had opened up another conversation with another on board the ship, a Lieutenant Haverson. She then turned, and found the civilian staring at her.

"What is it?" Kelly asked. The civilian immediately turned away. "Nothing. Just admiring a Spartan. I know a lot of people that would kill in order to meet a Spartan in real live, so I'm taking everything in as I go."

Kelly nodded, though she still didn't like the civilian's tone of voice. While it sounded legitimate, she also knew the woman was hiding something. But she didn't have the time to investigate it, though, as the Dropship entered their Carrier's hanger. They all got out, and the ODST dropped the Wraith they had taken with them before parking the ship properly. Kelly then got a first good look at 'Six', as she got out of the tank.

Six was a bit small for a Spartan, and she had armor from the Reach Armories instead of the Mjolnir variants they developed at Chi Ceti. It was, however, heavily used. There were a lot of blood spatters on it, and Kelly could make out a large amount of Elite blood in the mix. She had a long Cut in the visor of her helmet, and Kelly could see, from the looks he gave the Elite, that it had come from a Sangheili. She had one piece, however, that stood out from her armor. While the Chi Ceti armor was more powerful, the Reach version was more customizable, and had more options in armor. Six had left most of her armor like the basic version, but her right shoulder had a pauldron on it, with a bent knife attached to it.

Kelly saw, to her slight surprise, that Jun immediately stepped over to her, and Six immediately stepped over to greet him. Kelly listened in on their conversation.

"Jun. I should have known the talkative ones always survive."

"Funny. I was about to say the same about you. Still taking teeth from Elites?"

"Oh, getting jealous I'm a few kills up on you?"

"At least I don't start hugging elites."

"You would, if you could get a better Sniper Rifle out of it."

"True enough." Jun then gestured at the odd attachment on her shoulder. "So Emile's gone?"

"Yep. I originally couldn't recover it, but the Split-lip that gave the speech handed it to me as a gesture of respect."

Jun looked back at the elite, and started to turn towards it. He then seemed to recognize it, and started towards it. Six stopped him immediately. "Yes, he's the same one that got Kat. In fact, he's the same one that got Emile. But he's gotten over it. I suggest you do the same."

"He deserves to die for what he did, Six. And given your ability to hold grudges, I thought you would feel the same way."

"I still do. But I know Command would want him alive. For interrogation and research if nothing else. Besides, didn't he openly condemn his own kind in front of hundreds of Covenant soldiers?"

Jun seemed to weigh it over a bit, before he lowered his rifle again. "If you trust him, I-"

"I never said I trusted him. I'm just saying he's worth more alive than dead at the moment."

Jun seemed to nod. "Fair enough." Jun then moved to join the others at the exit to the hanger. Six followed him, and Kelly jogged a bit to catch up. Six looked at her, and, while walking, held out her hand for shaking. Kelly shook it. "I'm Six. Not my original name, but I'm sticking with it for now."

"I'm Kelly. If you talked with Sam or John, then I certainly don't need an introduction."

"Pleasure meeting you. So, what have you heard of me, from the Psycho Jun?"

Jun called over at that. "You and Emile were the psycho's."

"Piss off, Jun."

Six then looked at Kelly again. Kelly, tilting her head, answered Six' previous question. "Only that you were the toughest Spartan Jun knew, if a little insane."

Six nodded. "Well, he's not that far off. I got no problem with going crazy at times."

"You're always crazy." Linda said, who caught up with them. "You have the skill of a surgeon, and yet have two combat knifes. I dread the day I have to turn my back to you."

"ha-ha."

Linda then turned to Kelly. "In all seriousness, though, she's really good. She saved my life multiple times when I got multiple life-threatening injuries. She's an amazing pilot, though I have never seen a good landing with her at the wheel. She's also fond of jumping at Elites to fight them at close range, and often resorts to fighting with Energy Swords."

"Must be _real_ interesting if Will takes notice of that." Kelly noted. The two woman laughed, and Six looked between them. "Who's Will?"

Kelly pointed. "The Spartan currently walking with Sam and Grace, wielding that new Rocket Launcher. He's also our Close-Quarters combat expert."

Six looked for a moment. "We'll see." she finally said with a sinister tone. Linda started laughing. "Don't go at him the same way you do with Elites. As much as he might irritate you, he's actually valued by us."

"I'll promise to let him live. But I can't promise anything about his bones."

The woman laughed. "Oh, we've got a true aggressive bitch among our midst."

"Indeed. Time for the barbeque, Linda"

"Can I bring the meat?" Six asked, and all three of the woman laughed. They stopped when they got to the bridge, and saw what was going on.

It was quite weird. They had jumped to SlipSpace, but instead of the usual blackness of SlipSpace, the area around them outside was swirling with lights, often in unusual colors. What was even weirder, was that a Covenant Fleet was following them in Slipspace, and closing in on them.

But what topped the hat was that the Covenant ships were firing on them, in direct lines of plasma.

And none of the shots, no matter how close they got, hit their mark. They all went of in swirls, loops, turns, or even in the oddest of cases, disappeared, only to appear again straight in front of the Covenant ships. They all hit the ships, of course. For some reason none of the things hit their vessel, and Kelly was grateful.

But then one of the ships, a corvette, pulled ahead of the others, and Kelly saw what it was planning. Whitcomb noticed as well. "They're moving in to board us. Chief, you and your team get ready to repel them. Fol, Sarah, Lena and Halsey are with me. Marines, ODST's: keep this bridge secure.

The Chief nodded, and the Spartans all moved to the rear. They all stopped when something came out of the hatch.

A Huragok.

"Hold fire." John said. "The Huragok are with us now. They are all about repairing the ship, and have good intel for us."

"Roger." Fred said.

"I copy." Anton said.

The Spartans, which consisted of John, Kelly, Sam, Fred, Linda, Six, Will, Anton, Grace, Li and Jun, moved to the rear of the ship, where the only other umbilical of the ship was. The topside one was currently linked with the Gettysburg. Kelly noted that most of the Huragok, though they went aside, all looked at the Spartans. Kelly paid it no mind, however, as she was looking for something else.

A dataport she could insert Kalmiya into.

"Kalmiya, highlight any dataports you see."

"Was already doing so. No luck so far."

at that point, a new voice added herself to the conversation. "Kalmiya. No time no see."

"Hello, Cortana. Still trying to outdo the big sister."

"Already done so. This ship is testimony to that."

"Give me a similar opportunity, and I'll take her before you can read the analyses of all current cases of cancer _and_ all the reported locations of Crocodiles."

"It's a deal."

"Care to explain all that, Cortana?" John asked as they moved. Kelly was interested in the friendly rivalry as well.

"Kalmiya is, for all intends and purposes, my 'older sister'. She was used to test all the intrusion software that would later be put into me. Halsey has never erased her, for multiple reasons."

"Because of my shining personality." Kalmiya added. "and the fact that I haven't got a single sign of Rampancy since 2537."

Kelly actually looked at the corner of her helmet again. Kalmiya, as agreed upon, displayed her avatar there. Kalmiya looked at her. "Yes, I'm well past my sell-by date. But Cortana's still a few places behind me."

"Later." Six said, as they got to the umbilical. Unfortunately for them, it was at an intersection, meaning that they had to split their forces among the three corridors. "Let's focus on keeping this secure."

The others nodded. Six then hit the wall, and another Huragok emerged. It carried something, and unfolded it. Kelly was suddenly grateful it was with them now.

It was a Plasma turret. Aimed at the hatch of the umbilical. Others emerged from the hatch as well, caring similar cases. Six moved to one of them, and patted it carefully on the head. "Rise, you are a guardian angel."

( _I do my part. Thanks to an initiative from your first construct, The Umbilical is now incompatible, and they'll be forced to cross in hard vacuum. Be advised that me and the others will be pulling back, and seal the closest of doors to prevent the vacuum from affecting the rest of the ship._ )

Kelly noted the text appeared in a different font than Kalmiya originally used. Was it forced by the Huragok?

She then turned to the others. The Huragok had finished setting up the turrets for them, three in total, and they retreated back into the hatches.

"Groups of three." John started. "Fred, lead Grace, Linda and Will at the left Corridor. Anton, lead Li, Six and Jun at the right one. Sam, Kelly, you're with me. Plant mines at the front of the hatch. Use-"

but then they were interrupted, ads plasma-fire raced to them from down the corridor. Linda and Jun took aim down the corridor with their Sniper Rifles, and they each shot twice. Four Elites went down.

"Still elites out there, but they all have taken cover behind the walls. They're likely moving to flank us."

Six eyed the corridor. "Wait one, Chief." she then sprinted down the corridor, and rounded the corner where the fire had come from. Sam bumped Linda's shoulder. "I'll bet my Rocket-Launcher for it that she'll do it in less than ten minutes."

"That long?" Jun asked. "I'll bet five. My combat knife and the manufacturer I get my Sniper Rifle from."

"Deal." Sam said. The two of them then turned back to the hallway. John turned to him and Linda. "Didn't the two of you clear the ship of surviving crew members?"

"We missed about twelve of them, mostly of the ranger variant and Spec-Ops variant." Linda answered. "We know because we asked Rise and a few of his buddies every time about the composition of the active crew." John nodded.

After about seven minutes, Six emerged again, with even more stains on her armor. She was carrying a necklace of dog-tags, with a cord hanging from it. About thirty or forty Elite teeth hung from it.

Six turned to them. "Emile is dead now, so what is it you were betting about now, Jun?"

"Merely the name of the manufacturer of my Sniper Rifle. Misrah Armories, by the way."

Sam nodded, and all of them prepared for the inevitable onslaught.

* * *

John stared at the umbilical, waiting for the inevitable attack.

They had set up defenses in the hallway, after Tends to Rise had ferried supplies in from the _Gettysburg._ Namely, deployable covers, Oxygen tanks in case they had to fight in open vacuum for longer periods of time and a few fusion coils set up as traps. The Corvette, despite Cortana's and Whitcomb's best efforts to evade or destroy it, had come up alongside them, and had extended it's own umbilical instead of forcing a connection with the one of the _Ascendant Justice_. After blasting the one on the _Ascendant Justice_ apart of course.

They were busy at the lock for three minutes now. They had created a miniscule hole a minute ago, but as soon as one attempted to look through, John had shot at it with a picked up service pistol. The Elite on the other side had retreated, and they were now waiting until the hole was big enough that they all could step through.

Then the sound of plasma cutting stopped, and John knew they were running out of time. "Get ready." He called. All of the Spartans lighted their acknowledgement lights green. John raised his rifle, and he saw Kelly do the same. Sam already had his minigun braced on the deployable cover in their part of the hallway. The other Spartans were all out of view beyond the corridors.

They waited, and three seconds passed. Then John started counting how long they were waiting. It went well past three minutes before Six broke the silence. "Anyone got a story to pass the time?"

"Well-"

"Not you, Jun."

"Wait." Linda said. "I want to hear this."

"Me too." Will added. "I barely know anything about our resident sociopath. Please?"

Six sighed, and John suspected Jun was smirking at this. "It all started at Szurdok ridge. Six and I were deployed on a reconnaissance mission to discover what was in a Covenant dark zone on Reach. We were just having fun, discovering a Covenant Stealth Pylon, and I was pla-

At that moment, the door blew open, and John saw two of a new class of Elites coming through first. They wore the odd helmets and armor of Ultra Elites, but instead of the usual white, they had dark-brown armor mixed with grey. They had Gravity hammers on their backs, fixed onto unusual backpacks with a cable running from it.

At the other end of the cable was a Plasma Cannon, and the Elites were firing them as they walked, without the seeming precaution of conserving ammo.

"Open Fire!" He called. Every Spartan did so, taking the Elites in a three-way crossfire, John Kelly and Sam at the front of them, and the rest in the side hallways.

But the Elites, despite being at the center of the barrage, never seemed to falter, and their shields were taking it all. Sam let go of the minigun with one hand, grabbed his rocket-launcher, and fired two rockets at one of them. He hit them deadcenter. The first one stumbled, and his shields finally lit up. But they survived.

"They're tough." Sam called, after he dropped the spent launcher. He manned the minigun again, and focused his fire on one of them. John joined him in firing. Kelly, after throwing a grenade, did likewise. They were, though slowly, downing it's shields at an increasing rate. The Elite, realizing what the Spartans were doing, was trying to hide behind it's partner, who had stronger shields at that moment.

But Fred, catching on to John's plan, called out. "Focus fire! One of the things at a time!"

then every Spartan fired on the weaker one, and sure enough, it's shields went down.

But the it's armor proved to be another issue. It just didn't go down. John swore to himself. _There had to be a way._

 _The Plasma packs on their backs!_

He put his Assault rifle on his back, and grabbed his pistol. The Heavy Elites were now turned sideways to the other sides, and were engaging Fred's and Anton's respective parties. John lined up his shot at the plasma pack on the back of the Elite, and fired a shot.

The pack exploded after a single hit, and John saw it took down not only it's carrier, but also downed the shields of the other Heavy, and severely buckled it's armor. Two shots from Linda and Jun killed it.

And immediately afterwards a dozen Elites emerged from the umbilical.

"So much for our peace and quiet." Jun said, as he killed two with a single shot. Immediately two more emerged to take their places.

"They're just lining up to die." Six said, as the Elites started to swarm the intersection, and Six seemed to be having fun. But the Elites just kept coming, and no longer emerged merely after one or two of their comrades fell. John dropped his emptied Assault Rifle, and grabbed his Shotgun, shooting at two of the Elites swarming Sam's position. John, taking too long at freeing Sam up from a group of three, instead hit one in the back with the stock of his weapon, and it's Shields fell. Sam immediately grabbed said Elite, and threw him at the other two, downing all three. Kelly and John finished them off, and turned back to the masse of Elites.

And immediately were forced to open fire, as the Elites came at them again. Kelly dropped her Shotgun, having run out of ammo. She picked up two plasma rifles, and fired at the Elites, downing their shields. John immediately killed it with his rifle, and reloaded. The worked in tandem from then on, with Kelly downing the Shields, and John finishing them off. The Elites didn't offer them any reprieve, though.

"Why won't they just die?" he heard Six yell, though he assumed it was more a question aimed at the Elites rather than as a question at one of the Spartans. "Well, it wouldn't take so long if you could aim!" Jun immediately yelled. Linda immediately joined in. "Ah, so _that's_ why you always close the distance: you can't aim for shit!"

"When you get the 'Hyper-lethal' rating, then you can say that. Until then, keep on killing."

"Touched a nerve, Six?" Kelly called from their position.

"In your dreams!"

they all then went at it again, with Sam detaching his minigun from the deployable cover, and moved upwards to suppress the Elites. There had to be already about two dozen corpses in their corridor _alone_!

"How many Elites can they press into that Corvette?" Will called out. "We're being overrun here!"

"If we retreat, they'll regain control of the ship!" Six shouted back. "Just hold the line!"

They did, but John knew they were starting to lose. Already was he running low on his Assault rifle, and Kelly had already had to switch her depleted Plasma Rifles out for new ones two times. And it was a miracle Sam's minigun was still firing at all. John saw from the corner of his eye that it's barrel was starting to glow, and that smoke was coming from the casings that flew out. Indeed, they would die if they stayed here.

Then his rifle ran out again, and John grabbed for another clip on his belt.

He couldn't find one.

 _Blast_!

He picked up a Plasma Repeater, and started to fire away at an approaching Elite wielding a sword. Sam downed it's shields, but suddenly stopped firing. John sprayed the Elite's head with Plasma and, after killing it turned to Sam.

And saw him reloading the Rocket launcher now that John was blasting away at the Elites. On the ground lay the turret, it's barrel glowing and a lot of smoking spent cases lay next to it. The ammo boxes that were supposed to be attached to Sam's back were laying on the ground. They were all open.

And empty.

 _Damn. Without that turret, they'd be overrun._

Sam, having finished reloading, raised the rocket-launcher. And fired at the umbilical, where most of the Elites were still coming from.

The blast killed about a dozen of the Elites, and the Umbilical beyond seemed to be damaged. But it held.

 _If the Umbilical was severed, the Elites would stop coming._

John started advancing, despite the fact that the Elites were still coming. The others all were silent, too busy with their own troubles and corridors to care about what happened next to them.

John, despite the Elites' large amount of bodies slowing his progress, made it to the intersection again.

It was a bloodbath. Sam and the others at the Plasma turrets had done a good job of killing all the elites in the intersection, but their sheer number was overwhelming them. From the corner of his eye, he could see that Anton and Li were lying on the ground, both either unconscious or dead, and that Jun and Linda were both leaning on one of their legs. Six and Fred were taking the brunt of their respective assailants in order to buy time for the others to recover a bit. But they were taking quite a bit of a pounding themselves, and he could even see Six' helmet was damaged even further, with two holes in her visor. The amount of bodies in each corridor numbered in the dozens, per corridor, and in the intersection itself the Elites were actually piled up due to the amount of their dead. John stepped back into the intersection, and opened a com to the admiral.

"Sir, this is the Master Chief. We're being overwhelmed. I repeat: we're being overwhelmed. Request bombardment of the Covenant Umbilical to cut off the enemy's troop numbers."

"Polaski's already in a Spirit and on her way to do so, Chief. ETA is about three minutes."  
"I copy, admi- Ugh!"

the last part happened as an Elite General ran into him, and toppeled him. The General jumped on top of him, his gauntlet blade activated. John grabbed it's head, and pushed it to the side, but the moment it was off, he could see Sam was similarly overwhelmed, grabbing two elites while two others were holding on to his arms, with a third on it's back. Kelly was outside of his field of vision. They couldn't help him. Then the General was on him again, pinning him to the ground by the throat with one arm, and holding it's blade up for a killing blow with the other. This time, however, his energy sword was raised, and John saw he couldn't stop it in time.

Then a blade emerged and withdrew from the Elite's chest, and it fell to the side. John emerged from behind it, and he looked up.

Kelly and Six were standing there, with Kelly holding one of Six' blades. It's hilt was drenched in Elite blood, indicating Kelly had saved him. Six, along with Sam, was holding off the Elites in the corridor, firing away with her Covenant Carbine. Sam was firing with a Needle rifle he picked up from an Elite corpse, with a Plasma Pistol in his other hand. Kelly held out her hand for John to use as support as he got up. He took it, and Kelly pulled him back up. John looked around, and saw there were at least four Heavies in the Umbilical, with at least ten zealots in the tunnel behind them, and that they were almost onto them. The moment those got into the ship, the Spartans could survive. They had trouble keeping it secure as it is, and if any of the Heavies alone got into the corridor, they would be overwhelmed by sheer firepower. John looked at the others in his field of vision, and nodded. Kelly and Sam did as well, and he saw Six, though looking ahead at the Elites, gave a thumbs-up. John raised his recovered Plasma Repeater...

and flew forward, as a mysterious force pulled them into the umbilical. The other elites all flew in as well, and John could see at least three other Spartans flew into it as well. One of them managed to hold on to the wall before being pulled in, but the other two flew in anyway. John managed to grab hold of the deployable cover that got stuck in the doorway, and he saw Kelly and sam had managed to grab hold of something else before that. Six stood on the deployable cover John hung on to. She put her Carbine onto her back, and held out her hand to John. He grabbed it, and was pulled onto it. He looked over the edge.

The umbilical was severed halfway through, and he saw that all of the elites inside had been exposed to SlipSpace. He also saw Jun holding on to the edge of the doorway. John grabbed hold of the cover again, lowered himself a bit, and held out his hand to Jun so that he could grab on to it. After a few tries of reaching, Jun finally managed to get a firm grip. John pulled him up, and Six helped both on the cover. The cover itself, however, was not designed to take the weight of three Spartans, and it started to buckle under their weight. Six jumped to a small hole, which turned out to be a Huragok hatch. She fell in with her legs, and disappeared for a moment. She emerged after about a second, and had an Oxygen tank to her helmet, and it covered the holes in her helmet. John and Jun jumped to the same hole. John hit a button as he landed, and a door closed between them and the hole where the docking umbilical used to be.

John breathed a sign of relief, and called out. "Blue-Team, sound off."

"This is Fred. All green."

"Linda. Alright."

"This is Will. No injuries, but no sign of Anton or Li here."

"This is Grace, uninjured. Whoever did that deserves a medal, for I was getting overwhelmed."

"Sam here. Kelly's with me, but her transmitter was damaged during the fight. No injuries except a few muscles stretched too far."

"Six here. No injuries, but Armor integrity is compromised. I can't hit vacuum anytime soon."

"Jun here. A dislocated shoulder from that final vacuum pull, but nothing otherwise." "Jun seemed to pause, and John suspected he already knew what came next. "I saw Li and Anton fly past into the Umbilical as I nearly went out myself. They were already dead, with Two Rangers ambushing them from behind."

John grimaced, and added them to the MIA roster as well. "Regroup at the central corridor. Six, get Tends to Rise, and have him lock the nearest doors near the breach down. Everyone else, regroup at the Bridge." he got acknowledgement lights from all of them, and he headed there himself, with Jun following close behind. Six stayed for a moment, and she whistled into the corridor.

He raised the Admiral. "Sir, Breach secured. Two KIA, one injured, and the rest operational. Have Cortana save the camera views, for we encountered a new class of Elites, specialized in heavy weaponry. Coined term: Heavy Elites, or Heavies."

"Roger Chief. We had a short scuffle with the survivors of the crew ourselves. Get back here, for we're about to exit this odd version of SlipSpace, and we need to plan our next move. Both ships took a bit of damage, so be careful."

The admiral signed off, and the Chief nodded. He caught up with the others, who'd already gathered near one of the hatches, and they all headed for the bridge.

Two dead, one injured, and a lot of ammunition spent. It was a miracle the costs had been so few. John mused about this on his way to the bridge.

When he was knocked down, and an Elite appeared in front of him, smiling as it raised it's energy sword for a killing blow.

* * *

 **Here is the end of this Chapter. Fol, making his defection more known. the rescue from the Forerunner facility, and the pickup of the crystal. The engagement on the AJ-G (Ascendant Justice-Gettysburg), which I altered a bit. enjoy the cliffhanger. as usual, I would like to get reviews for this**

 **Gharst Omenlumin**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hello, Fellow Legionairs. Here is another chapter I've managed to work out. A note of apology in advance: A puppy was just added to our household, and while she's adorable as hell, she's taking a hell of a time to raise, and some of that time will be taken from the time I can write this, so the speed at which I will upload will be lowered a bit.**

 **Request: I'd like a review for this story, So I can improve it. I can't improve if no one tells me where I'm going wrong.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own the Halo Universe.**

* * *

Halo: First Strike Chapter 4

Whitcomb looked on, as the Corvette, despite the Plasma projectiles raging around it, managed to dock despite Cortana's best efforts to evade it. It fired on their own docking umbilical as it did so, destroying it at point blank range. They then extended their own, and docked with the ship. If all went to plan, the Chief and his Spartans would repel the boarders, and they would be on their way soon enough. Whitcomb looked around at those on the bridge again.

The Marines, consisting of Sergeants Johnson and Stacker, and Private Dubbo. There were two ODST's on the Bridge as well, Locklear and Wilson. Wilson was currently standing near one of the doors with one of the civilians, Sarah McGregor. She was keeping her pistol raised in the direction of the hallways, weary of potential surviving crew-members. The other two civilians taken with them from Reach, Dr. Halsey and Wilson's daughter Lena Wilson, were sitting in one of the trenches to be out of the way of the crew. The only other additions of the crew were Lieutenant Haverson, an ONI officer from the Autumn, Elite Field-Marshal Fol Katarn, the first member of the Covenant to genuinely defect, and Sheila Polaski, their Pilot. The last three were all manning stations on the central platform of the bridge, helping Whitcomb with manning the ship.

And of course their was Cortana. She had been genius enough to first jump into the main scrap-field of UNSC wrecks in orbit of Reach, and had docked the most intact UNSC frigate there was to find, and that turned out to be the Gettysburg. It was a stroke of genius because they had a number of advantages. They could get home now without violating the Cole-Protocol. They had a serviceable escape ship if trouble on this one became too hot. And, as it turned out, the Gettysburg had been deployed with a small number of Spartan-III's, for a number of spare parts for their armor was aboard, detected by Cortana as she'd scanned the Ship's inventory.

Then Whitcomb turned his attention back to the Space-Battle. It didn't look good, despite the fact they hadn't suffered any hits yet. They were outnumbered twelve to one, despite the fact only one ship was close enough to engage them. He turned to Cortana. "Cortana, how many ships are currently pursuing us, counting the Corvette as well?"

"I am currently counting thirteen ships, though at least five are currently out of commission. There are, as far as I can detect, three Covenant ships that are an immediate threat: The Corvette docked with us, A damaged Cruiser ten thousand kilometers off our Port bow, and a Carrier further away, which was entirely undamaged. These were their priority targets.

"Haverson, Pressurize the Hanger bay of the Gettysburg. Fol, be prepared to fire on the Cruiser off our port bow, point-blank range. Use the Plasma turrets."

"Aye, sir." Haverson said.

"Plasma Cannons ready to fire on your mark, admiral."

Whitcomb nodded, and turned back to the multiple displays. He had one run the status of the ship, the frontmost one permanently display the battle outside, and a third display the camera of the battle near the docking tube.

It wasn't going that well. The Spartans were holding up incredibly well, but they were starting to be overwhelmed by the sheer number of the elites. They had just taken down a new class of Covenant soldiers, and were now under assault from a swarm of Covenant Elites, all intend on swarming all over the ship, and only being stopped by the Spartans shooting them before they passed too close. He looked at the third of the ships again, the Corvette currently docked to them.

Cortana was currently changing their positions all the time, maneuvering them so the Corvette was taking all of the blows. The fact it was only still there at all was because it was docked to them. If they cut that umbilical, they would be free. He turned to Polaski. "Warrant Officer, take one of the Spirits and destroy that Umbilical. It is keeping that Corvette way too close to us, and the Chief's team can't hold them all busy forever."

"Yes sir!" she said, and moved to the hanger. Locklear went with her, to escort her. The civilian, Sarah, got away from the door to let them pass. Instead of returning to the door, however, she moved to take Polaski's place at one of the consoles. Whitcomb nodded, acknowledging her initiative.

He then turned back to the main battle. "Lieutenant, Plot a collision course for the Portside cruiser, near the bow if possible at this angle, and be ready to open the Hanger doors of the Gettysburg. Fol, fire on my mark."

"Aye, admiral." Fol said, moving about immediately. Haverson hesitated, but did his task. Whitcomb could sympathize with that. A collision course was suicidal, due to the fact that the armor on Covenant ships was tougher, and the UNSC ships had no energy-shields. Whitcomb hoped the ship's Huragok could change all that.

He then looked at the Cruiser ahead of them, which was closing steadily. Five thousand meters. Four thousand meters. _Come on, come on!_

"Sir, Collision course is now imminent." Cortana said.

There. "Lieutenant, open the doors! Fol, fire the Plasma cannons aimed at the Cruiser, NOW!"

Both of the officers did their tasks. The _Ascendant Justice/Gettysburg_ jumped a bit, as the force of the massive depressurization of the hanger bays sped the ship forward... and evaded the cruiser to their Portside by a few mere meters.

It also brought them in a perfect firing position for a broadside of the cruiser. And Fol was an excellent shot. The Cruiser was gutted, and Whitcomb could see multiple explosions were tearing the ship apart. And Fol wasn't even finished firing. He fired at the engine block of the cruiser, and saw that it took massive damage. Fol apparently hit the reactor, for suddenly the massive engine block exploded, and Whitcomb could see it caused a chain-reaction across the entire ship. It broke apart into multiple pieces. The pieces rapidly fell behind, as they still travelled at high speed through SlipSpace.

Whitcomb grinned, and turned to Fol. "Excellent shot."

"Thank you, Admiral."

He then turned to the Carrier. It was still undamaged, and was keeping it's distance at the moment. Whitcomb saw it was constantly firing at any form of debris that came too close. It didn't seem to fire at anything more distant than five kilometers, for it seemed after that the plasma bolts seemed to loop off, and, in the most oddest of cases, teleport away, only to reappear near another ship. It even had launched a few of it's Seraph fighters to absorb the worst of the blows.

 _So the rodder's smart. I can't repeat the same trick again. Shame._

Whitcomb then spotted something interesting: a molten wreck of a ship, a Covenant Battlecruiser. It's hull was all melted from the heat of multiple hits, and it was starting to misshape into a ball, slowly but steadily. It wouldn't survive this SlipSpace bubble for long.

It also was perfect for Whitcomb's forming plan.

"Haverson, set course for the Molten wreck of a cruiser, off our Starboardside. When it is being pushed by us, steer for that Carrier. Let the Covenant take abuse from their own trash."

Haverson nodded, and set out to do so, with help from Cortana. Whitcomb kept looking at the oncoming battle.

And jerked around as he heard an odd sound, like someone using a downgraded Ghost.

It were five Elites, all in Ranger armor. They had burst through the bridge doors, and were all headed for the Central Platform. Fol turned away from his console, and activated an Energy Sword. Whitcomb noted that Fol still didn't seem to have recovered from the hits of a Fuel-Rod gun, as he seemed to lean on one leg as he moved.

But it didn't seem to stop him, for he jumped up, and intercepted one of the Rangers as it was about to land on the Platform. He pierced it's chest before it could get it's Focus Rifle to bear on him. Both crashed to the floor, with Fol landing on the Ranger Elite's blue vacuum-tight helmet. He crushed it as he brought his full weight to bear. There sounded a grenade blast just as Fol jumped down again.

Johnson and Wilson ran up to the platform as well, and they both aimed their weapons, both Shotguns, at two of the elites. They fired and downed their shields. Johnson killed his with a second shot, and Wilson was about to do the same, when a Shot from Whitcomb's left rang, and the Elite fell off of the platform. Whitcomb looked over the edge, and saw the visor of the Ranger was shattered, and that there was a hole in it's head where there wasn't supposed to be one. Whitcomb looked behind him again.

Sarah McGregor stood there, her pistol smoking. It had a large barrel, and resembled more of a revolver than an actual pistol. But the ammo seemed to be strong, and had to pack quite a punch in order to penetrate the visor with a single round. Sarah drew it up to her mouth, and blew the smoke coming from it away. She then aimed the pistol over the edge again, looking for the final two elites.

But it wasn't necessary. Stacker and Dubbo had teamed up on one, and were busy putting it down for good, stabbing it in the head with their combat knives in multiple places. It's legs were barely even recognizable, ripped apart by the earlier heard grenade blast.

The other was being lifted up by Fol, and was thrown into the hallway. The Elite got up and brandished it's own Energy-Sword. But it didn't stand a chance, as Fol grabbed it's sword-hand as it was about to stab at Fol, and Fol wrenched the wrist around, unbalancing the opponent with the force of it. Fol then swung his sword at the Elite across the chest, opening it up. It looked up at Fol, and Fol activated an Energy dagger inside his wrist, and stabbed it in the head, through the helmet visor and into the eyes.

Fol stood up from his killing, and looked at the others.

And fell down to the ground, his chest starting to bleed again.

The marines and other soldiers all ran towards him, as did Halsey. She stood over him, and examined his chest. Fol looked up, and said, in a deadpan tone. "I don't do Autographs. I don't pose for photo's. What could you want to do, standing above me like that?"

"You're bleeding in multiple places, and need medical attention immediately. You a-"

Whitcomb diverted his attention, as Polaski reported. "I've made it to the Spirit, and am currently taking off as I speak. On my way to the Umbilical, ETA about three minutes."

"Very good, Polaski. Let me know when you make it there." Whitcomb then turned to another console, as the Chief reported. "Sir, this is the Master Chief. We're being overwhelmed. I repeat: we're being overwhelmed." Indeed, it looked to Whitcomb over the cameras that the Chief was fighting an overwhelming, never-ending force of Elites. "Request bombardment of the Covenant Umbilical to cut off the enemy's troop numbers."

"Polaski's already in a Spirit and on her way to do so, Chief. ETA is about three minutes." Whitcomb told. "I copy, admi- Ugh!" The Chief said, but then he was shoved in the back by an Elite, and it threw the Chief to the ground. Whitcomb hoped Polaski could get to the Umbilical in time.

Whitcomb turned back to the battle in SlipSpace. It was nearly coming to an end. During the scuffle on the Bridge, Cortana had managed to get the damaged Cruiser's Hull around their bow, and was currently making her way towards the carrier. They were almost at it, when Polaski reported. "Sir, I'm at the Umbilical. The Corvette's taken heavy damage, and will rip apart any minute now. But the Umbilical is still holding strong. Request permission to bombard the Umbilical with Plasma fire."

"Permission granted, Warrant Officer."

"I copy. Wait one."

there was a short pause, and Whitcomb was sure the Umbilical took damage. But it held, and Whitcomb could see through the camera in the docking corridor that more Elites entered the Umbilical, despite it's swaying.

"Admiral, initial bombardment is unsuccessful. Target is still holding." Polaski reported.

 _Why, of all things, must the Umbilical of that ship be the one most enduring?_

"Polaski, initiate bomba-"

"Sir, Seraph fighters approaching Polaski's position. She either has to engage them, and let Blue-Team be overwhelmed, or destroy the umbilical, and let them slaughter her." Cortana reported. "The situation is dire, sir. I can't help until the Carrier is dealt with."

"Sir." Polaski said, who overheard the message "I can take it out. But it involves ramming the Umbilical."

"Negative, Polaski." Whitcomb immediately retorted. "You won't survive the impact. Not in this odd version of SlipSpace."  
"It's been an honor, Sir." Polaski finally said, before signing off. Whitcomb uttered a curse, as he aw Polaski line up for a ramming course with the Umbilical.

Too many damned heroes in this war.

Polaski rammed the Umbilical, and her Spirit exploded violently against the side of it. The explosion made the Umbilical tremble, before it snapped in half, with two-thirds of it staying with the Corvette as it started to fall behind, while the final part stuck to their own carrier. Debris flew out of the hole, along with, to Whitcomb's satisfaction, a lot of Elite bodies.

The Corvette itself, being connected to the Carrier only by the Umbilical, started to drift away, taking damage from both stray Plasma shots from the other Covenant ships trying to take them down, and a few of Cortana's own shots, fired from the sides of the carrier and the Frigate attached to her back. But it didn't drift away before scraping along the side of the two connected ships, opening up the side of the _Ascendant Justice_ , and taking down the communications dishes of the _Gettysburg_. But it broke apart from the damage it took, and it's pieces drifted away.

Straight into the other Carrier that the _Ascendant Justice/Gettysburg_ was headed towards. The pieces impacted the Carrier, and it's shields failed from the impact. The rear of the ship took damage, as the bow of the ship impacted the engine block. Though the carrier stayed intact, it was starting to take damage, as more and more plasma shots broke through.

But then the _Ascendant Justice/Gettysburg_ slowed down, and the scuttled Cruiser they'd been pushing forward sped on towards the carrier at an incredible speed. The Carrier attempted to fire on the wreckage coming towards it, but the piece was too large to stop now. It impacted the middle of the ship, and the sheer volume of the wreckage tore the carrier in half explosively. The Carrier's pieces drifted away, and apart. Debris flew all around it, and the Seraphs that were flying around it moments ago were now being destroyed either by the explosion, or the new torrent of debris they were trying to dodge.

Whitcomb turned his attention back to the Docking Umbilical, and saw the Chief was trying to raise him. He opened a com. "Sir, Breach secured." The Chief began. "Two KIA, one injured, and the rest operational. Have Cortana save the camera views, for we encountered a new class of Elites, specialized in heavy weaponry. Coined term: Heavy Elites, or Heavies."

"Roger Chief. We had a short scuffle with the survivors of the crew ourselves." The admiral answered. "Get back here, for we're about to exit this odd version of SlipSpace, and we need to plan our next move. Both ships took a bit of damage, so be careful."

The Admiral looked to his left, where Sarah was attempting to man the Navigations console. After a moment, she finally found the right button, and they exited SlipSpace. At last.

Then they heard a roar coming from the corridors. Everyone looked.

* * *

Six was Sprinting to catch up with Blue-Team. Tends to Rise had just closed off the docking hatch, which was now open to hard vacuum. The rest of Blue-Team was already on their way to the bridge, and were halfway by the time she'd finished. She was now trying to get back to the group.

The new damage to her helmet started to bother her. During the fight near the Umbilical, she had thrown a Frag grenade at a large mass of Elites. But a stray shot detonated it prematurely. She had survived, and her visor had taken the blunt of it, but it had jammed her visor, and her removal of the pieces of Shrapnel was rather violent, resulting in the enlarging of the holes they made, which inevitable simply formed two large holes. They damaged her helmet's inner systems, and her HUD was disabled because of it. Six would have to get it replaced somewhere if se was to contribute anything to the team.

She was just about to round the corridor, when she saw it. A shimmer further down the corridor. A Stealth Elite.

And halfway between it and her were Blue-Team. And the Shimmer was already sprinting towards them.

Six redoubled her efforts, and ran towards them. Aside from various other systems, her com was down, so she had no way to warn them properly.

She almost made it, when a second shimmer emerged from further back. It violently pushed the Chief to the ground, while it's twin decloaked and suppressed the rest of Blue-Team. The one that had floored John held his Energy Sword high, ready to strike him down.

When Kelly jumped between it and him, and grabbed the Energy Sword, trying to wrench it out of it's hand. The Elite, not to be outdone, grabbed a second Energy sword, and slashed it across her chest. Kelly fell onto her back, and looked up as it was about to Strike.

When Six finally made it, and ran at full speed into the Elite, toppling the both of them. Six unsheathed her new Kukri, and stabbed it in the Elite's neck. While the Elite tried to get it out, Six unsheathed her own Energy Sword, activated it, and stabbed the Elite in the chest, and the blade emerged from the back, ramming itself into the floor. The Elite died, roaring a curse at her. Six thought it sounded like the curse that Zealot on Halo had thrown at them, 'Nishum.

Six pulled her weapons out of the corpse, and deactivated her sword and holstered it. She shook off some of the blood sticking to the knife, before sheathing it as well. She then turned back to the others.

Most were clustered around Kelly, helping her up, with Jun and Fred making sure the other Elite was truly dead. The cut was nasty, and was quite deep, but didn't seem to have pierced any of Kelly's organs, for she was still standing. John seemed alright, having merely been thrown to the ground. Six grabbed her medical kit, and was about to unpack it, when Kelly shook her head. "It can wait until we can get to the bridge. I can hold on till then."

Six nodded. She had experienced firsthand how stubborn a Spartan-II can be, on Halo after they'd landed, and she wasn't about to perform a task in futility by trying again. She put away her medical kit again, and took point. The others followed her, and they all entered the bridge together. Six stayed near the doorway until everyone was through, and then closed the door.

The bridge itself was quite a mess as well, with Dubbo and Wilson dragging away a Ranger's corpse. Sam moved over to join them. John and Sam carried Kelly over to one of the trenches, and lay her down again. Halsey stepped over to help them, and she started treating Kelly. Fred, Linda and Will went to guard the doors. Jun and Grace looked in the other trench. Six went to join Wilson and the others, but noticed something.

Fol, laying on his back, his Chest-plate removed, and his eyes closed, seemingly asleep. Six went over to him. Jun noticed, and moved over too. Six put her finger to her faceplate, signaling for him to be silent. She then grabbed the Kukri, and made a mocking slash across Fol's throat with it. Jun laughed. "When will you actually do that?"

"When HIGHCOM is done with him, I will be the first in line for the firing squad."

At that point Fol spoke up, spooking the two of them. "I would like it if the two of you kept it down. I want to sleep."

"Want me to sing you a lullaby?" a voice said over the com. It sounded female, and was similar to Cortana's voice. It only sounded more... aged, filled with a bit more wisdom and experience. "Twinkle Twinkle Little Sta-"

"No, no lullabies. I hate those." Fol sounded off, like he was on a lot of painkillers. And it had to be a lot in order to drug an elite like that. Six shrugged at Jun, and left Fol to be. Six and Jun got to a quiet spot in a corner of the bridge, and Six started the conversation. "So. Who gets to keep Emile's knife?"

"I think you should have it. No offense, but that blade stays in the hands of psychopaths."

"I'm serious." Six said, with a sigh.

"As am I. I think Emile would want you to have it. And I have no desire to hold on to it. I am content with my armor as it is."

"As am I, Jun, but as you can see, my Helmet isn't quite content with it."

Jun chuckled. "I agree with that. Still, I don't want it. Keep it."

Six sighed to herself in relief. Like Wilson, she really liked that knife, regardless of who it had belonged to. And adding to the fact she now also had something that reminded her of Emile, her collection of mementoes was finally complete. She moved on to another subject. "So, how did you end up in a Squad of Spartan-II's?"

"Long story." Jun said dismissively.

Six gestured around her. "Where am I supposed to go? Most of the others are either at Kelly's side or busy with other duties. I have only you for entertainment."

Jun nodded, and was about to speak up, when Sam stepped over to them. "Is the younger generation enjoying itself?"

"No." Jun said. "Six keeps hounding me with questions about death and destruction I don't want to answer."

"Hey." Six said, mock offensively. "How can I help it if you end up with a Covenant Battalion inside a Forerunner cave system with the oddest diamond in human history?"

Sam hit his forehead with the palm of his hand. "All very interesting, but we're all gathering. Time for a swapping of tales."

"Oh, whoopie." Six said sarcastically.

And so the Spartans all gathered, in the trench so Kelly could listen in with ease. Halsey was close by and listening in, asking a few questions here and there. After a short while, Fol and Johnson walked by, and decided to sit on the edge of the trench, listening in. Everything relevant was told: The fate of CASTLE base, the discovery of the forerunner caves in mount Menachite, Gamma station in orbit over Reach, Six's initiative to save Linda, Halo, The Flood, Fol's official defection, the capture of this cruiser and the inevitable rescue by the Chief and Blue team of the other Spartans.

"And that brings us to this point." Cortana finished. "all a tale richer, and more experienced than ever." most people nodded. Johnson spoke up. "All well and good, Cortana, but it still leaves us here: In the middle of nowhere, with light damage to both ships, and, if Halsey is to be believed, stranded. That Crystal emits some sort of radiation that will kill us if we travel more than three days. And I'm starting to run out of cigars."

"Then you shouldn't smoke so damn much." someone called from the other trench. Johnson whipped his head around, and Six could see him make sweeping movements with his hands.

"Go and annoy your father, Lena. This is adult business."

"But listening in on you guys is lots more fun. And dad approves of it anyway."

"No, he doesn't. He wants you to be a good girl, and that you get a proper education."

"But I do let her listen in on you guys, if only because it gets her off my own back." Wilson called from Lena's trench. "Because Dubbo and Stacker are annoying me as hell with their insistences that I _must_ visit New York at least once."

"Then silence them, visit the city, and cause so much property damage you'll be banned from the city forever. Problem solved." Sarah called from the platform above. Six sighed, letting them chat.

Sam nudged her in the shoulder. "Hey, this is still better than back on Halo with Silva."

"Oh, come on. It could at least be understood if I yelled at Silva. Here it's not that easy."

"Oh, you're the one that's pissed off quickly, then." Kalmiya said. She was the one that sang the lullaby to Fol. "You'll cause quite the stir in this team."

"I believe I already did."

Then Whitcomb called them up. "Spartans, get up here. You'll want to get a look at this."

Most of the Spartans got up at that. John led them onto the central platform. The Admiral stood there, with Cortana visible on one of the displays. On another, larger display, a map of the local region was visible. "This is the Eridanus system, which is where we currently are." Haverson started. "We travelled from Reach to here in less than five hours."

"A journey which takes five weeks under normal circumstances." Cortana added. "And not all of that can be discounted to the Covenant drives. It is because of the Crystal. It somehow vastly decreased our travel-time, and got us there actually using less energy than for a three month journey. It could revolutionize SlipSpace travel."

"Unfortunately," Whitcomb said. "We took a bit of damage during our fight in Slipspace, and we need to make repairs. Our SlipSpace-drives are drained, and our Com-systems are down. We need, in short, a dockyard to make repairs at."

Cortana took on a more serious expression, and her tone changed slightly. "And we need to hurry. I haven't had a proper opportunity to tell you guys this, but it is important. The Covenant are headed for Earth."

Everyone on the Platform turned to Cortana, and the others all came up on the Platform. Even Kelly and Fol, despite their injuries. "You're sure?"

"Yes, McGregor. They make a few stops at a few places to stock up on supplies and Plasma, before gathering at a Command-and-Control station, to jump towards Earth from there. The fleet, at my last count, was about Four Hundred ships in size."

everyone was silent, save for a few that let out a sigh or a curse. Finally, Six looked at Cortana. "give me their route, any stops they will make from this moment, updated regularly. I want to plan a mission to destroy that Command-and-Control center." she turned to the Admiral. "With your permission, of course."

"I'll consider it." Whitcomb said. "But for now, let's find that Shipyard that we need."

( _We don't need a Shipyard._ ) The text appeared on Six' HUD, and she turned around, as did the other Spartans.

Tends to Rise was floating at the bottom of the Platform. And behind him were more Huragok.

Dozens and dozens of Huragok.

( _I and the other Huragok can repair the ship. And while it will take about a day longer without a Shipyard, we can have both ships operational soon enough._ )

Whitcomb looked at the Huragok. "And you're willing to do that for us?"

( _Under the Covenant rule, we had little to no choice. You, all of you, have given it to us now. You have already done a lot for us. It is time we do something for you. All we need are raw materials for the repairs, which can be gained from this star system's asteroid belt, and Spartans to assist in moving things of heavy weight._ )

Whitcomb immediately stepped forward. "You will get them. I promise you, you will get whatever you want when this is over. All of you." he turned to the others. "Wilson, Cortana, Kalmiya, drive the remaining Spirits, and, once me make it to the Asteroid belt, gather as many asteroids as the Huragok need. Half of all of the Spartans will aid on the internal repairs of the ship, and aid the Huragok where needed. Everyone else is on rest until the shift changes. Make shifts of two hours. Everyone else, dismissed."

Fol started to move away, but then suddenly ran back, looking at the displays. "Cortana, show all stops the Covenant fleet will make, Earth included.

Cortana looked at him quizzically, but complied none the less. A short star-map appeared on the display, showing a maze-like route across a few star systems, before they all gathered at a large space station, and jumping to Earth en-masse afterwards. Fol tapped the station, and the hologram of it enlarged, showing it's design. Fol smiled. "There, solid ground for the Spartans to land on. The Station has enough reactors that Blue Team could easily sneak in at one of them. Have them drop out of SlipSpace in a Spirit, and they can sneak onto the station proper. Piece of cake."

Whitcomb looked at the display again, and started to shake his head. "No. Too risky. They'd never make it out of a fleet of five hundred ships."

but John seemed to nod. "But worth the risk. Cortana, can you hack their systems remotely?"

"Negative, but I managed to take something from the Covenant AI before it was terminated. A self-copying software patch. I can copy my intrusion software, and send it with all of you. Provided you're all willing to take the risk."

John looked at all of the other Spartans. They all immediately understood his unspoken question. Kelly answered first, a second before Six. "I'm with you all the way, Chief. Let's do this."

"I'm in. I've got a bone to pick with the Covenant, and a large Space-Station surrounded by a large fleet is just too good an opportunity to pass up." Six said.

"Five hundred ships? Not enough to stop us." Sam said. "Let them bring it."

"I've survived Gamma station, and I've stayed with you throughout the fights on Halo. I'll be there this time." Linda said.

"I'm with you to the end of the line, brother. Let's finish this before it starts." Fred said. The others all gave similar affirmatives.

John turned to the admiral. "There, all of the volunteers, sir. Permission to make a First Strike?"

Whitcomb looked at all of them, and then sighed. "On one condition, Chief. Give them hell."

John nodded, and Six moved to leave the bridge.

* * *

Sam was busy getting up to the armory section of the Gettysburg, he saw something he never thought he'd see.

Fol had made his way to the ship as well, despite his injury, and was setting up what seemed to Sam to be a sparring square. He had laid out a dozen Energy Swords from multiple Elites. The had all the same design, but he was laying them out anyway, like he was preparing them to be redesigned. He also had formed lines with multiple damaged power cables. Sam moved over to join him, and helped him prepare it. Fol nodded at him, and handed Sam one of his own swords. Sam took it after a moment's hesitation.

"Just a little exercise. You don't mind that, do you?"

"No. Tell me truthfully, what did Six say to you? She seems to have... warmed up is a little overrated, but she seems calmer about you than when you two first met."

"The first time we met, she gave me my first scar." Fol then smiled, and lifted his helmet a bit, showing the full scar. Sam looked closer at it. "isn't that supposed to pass through an important artery, behind the eye?"

"That's what Six aimed to hit, yes. But she missed it by a millimeter. A fact I'm grateful for."

Sam chuckled. "I'll bet."

They continued on forming the sparring square, and after a while, Will walked in on them. He observed the blades and the square, and got the picture in about two seconds. "So, who's the one that goes in there with you, Fol?"

Fol looked up at Will for a moment. "I haven't thought that far ahead beyond extending a general invitation."

Will looked back at him, and entered the square, taking one of the Energy Swords with him as he went. "Well, consider the invitation accepted."

Fol looked at the Spartan again. "You are the close-quarters-combat expert of your brethren, aren't you?"

Sam knew Will was smiling at this. "Yes, he is. Even if he denies it. He can even kick Six' ass. If he tries hard enough."

Will looked at him again, mock-offended. "Oh, you're rooting for the Short Girl over me? I'm hurt."

Will was referring to the fact that Six was, with 205,7 centimeters in length, the shortest Spartan of all of them. Sam was about to protest it, when Fol intervened. "Spartan, you see the scar that blinds my right eye? Your 'Short Girl' did that to me. Defeat her in personal combat, and _then_ I'll join you in taking offense about that remark."

Will looked between the two of them. "Is that a challenge?"

"It might be." Sam admitted. "Are you willing to take it?"

Will pondered that for a moment, and then nodded. "Deal. I wanted to challenge her to a sparring match anyway, so why not get an audience along with it?"

Sam and Will shook to it, and Fol nodded as well. "Still, that leaves the duel about to take place right now, Will."

Sam nodded. "Indeed. I'll be the judge, usual rules: No killing, no intentional worsening of injuries, fight is only done when one of you is thrown out of the square, surrenders or is knocked unconscious."

Both Will and Fol nodded, and they each went to an opposing corner of the Square. Sam stood outside of the Square, and raised his right hand. "I know both of you are ready, so GO!" he immediately threw his arm down, signaling the match could begin.

Will immediately jumped forward. He kicked at Fol's head, who ducked below it. Fol immediately countered with a punch to the head and a kick to the legs. Will jumped back, out of range of both attacks. He then took on a boxer's stance, and stood ready, letting Fol come to him. Fol approached, but slowly. Fol made a few kicks and Strikes at Will, seemingly to test his defenses. Will blocked each and every one of them. The last one, Will turned into a counter, taking Fol's hand as he punched, and dragged him with him as he turned, hoping to unbalance him. Fol, however, grabbed Will by the head with his other hand, and pushed it forward. It floored Will, and Fol was about to strike down onto Will's head with his fist. Will rolled away, kicked Fol a bit away with his feet, and got up.

Will seemed to take Fol a lot more seriously, and made a strike of his own to test Fol's defense. Fol, however, immediately grabbed the hand, held it high, and kicked Will in the stomach. Will flew a meter backwards, and landed on his back. Fol made a single step forwards, and took a low stance, similarly to how he wielded an Energy Sword. "Oh, come on. Six gave me a better fight, and I wasn't even injured back then. I believe you can do better."

Will got up from the ground, but Fol was immediately onto him, kicking him as he got up. Will fell down again, and was seemingly grabbing his stomach in pain. Fol was about to give him another kick, when Will immediately grabbed Fol's leg, and pulled. Fol went down to the ground, and Will immediately got onto him, punching him in the face multiple times. Fol took a few strikes, and then kicked Will off of him. He did that so explosively that Will landed outside of the Square. Sam decided to call the fight to a halt.

"Enough! Victory for Fol, with Will being outside of the Square."

Both contestants got up, and shook each other's hands. "Good fight." Will said. "but I still want a rematch. Want to try again?"

Fol nodded. "One more time, or my injury to the chest will play up again." Fol then looked at Sam. "Again?"

Sam nodded, and raised his arm. "AGAIN!" and he threw it down again.

Will and Fol slowly stepped forward again. They each made a few strikes and kicks at each other, but both seemed to be on their guard, and weren't going into a full offensive. Sam was about to goad the both of them, but then Fol jumped upwards, making a kick at Will's face. Will ducked underneath it, and as Fol landed, dived straight into the larger Elite. Will then hit Fol in the stomach with a boxer's barrage of strikes, nearly too fast for Sam to track, and picked Fol up. And threw him down to the ground.

Sam noticed Fol wasn't resisting it, and was about to call it quits, when Fol kicked Will off again. And Fol immediately jumped up onto his feet as he did so, not using his hands at all. Fol stormed at Will, who was just getting up. Will, seeing Fol run towards him like that, immediately got to his feet, and stormed at Fol as well. Just as they were about to collide, Will let himself drop, and used his legs to throw Fol over him as Fol dived forwards.

And Fol landed outside of the Square. "Enough! Victory for Will, with Fol being outside the Square."

both contestants got up again, and they shook each other's hands. Just as Sam was about to congratulate the both of them, a slow clapping started behind him. Sam turned around, as Will and Fol did so as well.

Six was standing there, a new helmet on her armor. It was identical to her previous one, of the Powered Assault Armor/B variant, except this one looked brand new. And out of place, Sam thought, with the rest of her armor being covered in blood and dirt. But she just stood there, clapping her hands slowly.

"Impressive. For a wounded Field-Marshal and a Spartan-II. But I'm afraid I have to cut the dueling short. John and Fred's shifts are almost over, and we're scheduled to take their places.

Sam nodded. "Great. Can I blow something up?"

"No."

"Dammit."

Sam and Will got up, and followed Six as she led them to an outer airlock. Six grabbed a few oxygen tanks from the lockers, and handed one to each of them. After a moment, Grace joined them.

Six gestured them in, and everyone did so.

* * *

Repairs were going on well, Sam noted after a few days, but everything else was going to shit.

They had been hiding in the Asteroid belt for three days. On day one, nearly all of the outer hull had been repaired. The Huragok had recovered enough materials from the asteroids, and it turned out they didn't need the Spartans at all, only to break apart the larger asteroids. On the second day, the Huragok had repaired most of their communications systems, and were busy adapting as much Covenant tech into the Gettysburg as they could. On the third day, the incorporation of Tech had been completed, to the point the Gettysburg had gotten an Energy projector herself, along with two Plasma cannons near her stern. But things were now slowly grinding to a halt. They were starting to run low on supplies, and their SlipSpace generator were still without sufficient power to make a proper jump. And the others were starting to get restless.

Normally, the reactor of either ship should be able to recharge the SlipSpace drives enough to make a jump. But they couldn't, somehow, for two reasons. One, they couldn't jump due to the Crystal's emitting lethal Radiation, and two, because the energy sent to the drives seemed to be syphoned up by the Crystal. They were stuck here.

And now, here Sam was, on the observation bay of the Gettysburg. Fol had recovered from the Fuel-Rod blasts, and was up and moving about, as usual now. He often went to the 'Sparring Square', as the cargo bay where he and Sam had set up a square where people could spar in. Most of the other Spartans often went there as well.

Kelly, though up and moving again, was still recovering from the Sword strike she received on her way to the bridge of the Ascendant Justice. It didn't stop her, however, from ganging up wit Linda and Six to enjoy themselves. The three of them had even built up a tolerance to Wilson's epic music. Or at least Sam hoped that, for they listened to it often, and he found it horrible.

Most of the others were either to be found in that cargo bay, near the Sparring Square, or on the bridge of either ship. Halsey was often in the medical labs of the Gettysburg, reading research files recovered from CASTLE base and Halo. Kalmiya and Cortana were often assisting her. Lena, to her credit, had unofficially taken the role of Huragok coordinator, helping them prioritize where repairs and such were needed most, and helped them get along with the rest of the crew. Sam didn't keep accurate track of anyone else.

What bothered him, though, was Six. She was often nowhere to be found when not in the company of others. Sam had often looked for her, but she was untraceable. So, here Sam was, on the observation bay of the Gettysburg, looking out at the stars.

When he noticed something on one of the bigger asteroids.

A pair of Hanger doors, blasted open.

 _Of course! How could he forget them?!_

"Cortana, zoom in on grid 19 by 22, thermal enhance. The largest asteroid."

Cortana appeared, and complied. Sure enough, the image enhanced, and a bigger image of the asteroid appeared. She even enhanced the hanger doors.

The Asteroid was a mess, riddled with large holes from explosions. The hanger doors were bent inwards, and the hanger was wide open to space. The Thermal scans showed it was incredibly cold. To the point no one could be inside.

The Eridanus rebels were gone, defeated by an unknown enemy.

"I've informed the others. They're moving to get a good view as well." Cortana said. "John and the others are aware as well."

Sam nodded, and moved to the armory. Seeing no point in carrying his minigun _and_ rocket-launcher around all the time, he kept one of them in the Armory. He made it there.

And saw Six had beaten him to it, already exiting with a Battle Rifle, two Energy Swords, and a M319 Individual Grenade Launcher slung across her back. Sam noticed she had painted it, with flames on the sides, and a skill on the stock. _So she had been busy with a side project._

Sam grabbed his minigun, and made his way out of the armory, headed for the hanger of the Gettysburg.

He saw most of the other Spartans were already there, with only Grace and Will not there yet. Fol was there as well, carrying a crate of ammunition for various weapons. Sam saw it, fortunately, carried small ammo crates for his Minigun. He grabbed a few of them. As he sat down and attached them to his current supply of ammunition, he noticed Kelly and Linda had painted their weapons as well. Kelly had painted a red rabbit on her Shotgun, with a red trail coming from it's rear legs. It was painted on either side. Linda had her Sniper painted in more camouflage-able colors, except for some small areas of her weapon, which were painted in bright yellow. They both seemed very satisfied with it.

He noticed, as the others arrived, and Whitcomb and Haverson had ordered them into the base, Fol wasn't coming with them.

Wilson jumped into a Spirit, and signaled for the others to jump aboard as well. They all did. Most of the Spartans spread themselves around the prongs, with only Jun moving into the cockpit. They were currently alongside what used to be a docking tube, but was now a wrecked, bended piece of metal. Sam and the others jumped out after Wilson had guided them into place, and then flew back to a safe distance. Sam got to the airlock, and got inside. The other Spartans did as well.

To their surprise, the door shut behind them, locking them into the station. To their greater surprise, air started to cycle into the airlock, and after about a minute, the other door finally opened. Blue Team entered the base.

"What do we know about this place?" Jun asked.

"Major rebel base in the Eridanus system," John answered "raided in 2525 in order to extract Watts. Multiple attempts to locate the base have been made in the years afterwards, but due to a lack of signals, it was never found."

"It was found _once_." Six corrected. "I was tracking an entirely different insurrection group in 2549, followed one of their cargo convoys here. Messaged the location to ONI, and then was forced to move back, and let others handle the base. Apparently, ONI lost it again."

The others nodded, and John led them all to another door. It opened, and immediately the air was sucked out of the compartment again. The others all moved to the outside.

And saw a massacre.

The city inside the asteroid that Sam had seen last time, the one that they had infiltrated in order to get to Watts, was in ruins. The tower at the center that had once stood tall had fallen, and had taken down a third of the city below along with it. The rest of the city was scorched and ruined. There were bodies and debris floating everywhere, artificial gravity mostly disabled. Sam could even see that the Hanger beyond had blown inwards.

What unsettled him the most, though, was the lack of any Plasma Burns, anywhere. Or any Covenant bodies. Which meant Humans had done this.

"Grace." Sam said. "You sure you haven't been here? This seems like your handiwork."

"Funny. I was about to ask you the same question."

Sam moved closer to one of the corpses. It was a human, but it carried something odd.

A Covenant Plasma Pistol, with a new symbol on it's grip he had never seen before. It was a Sangheili skill, with a bullet in it's head. Behind it, like crossbones, were two human combat knifes, which looked like they were worn with use. The background was completed, with a small shield behind it.

What puzzled Sam was the text that surrounded it. It was in perfect English writing.

"No one left behind, for you will have a choice." Sam read aloud. "well, how cozy."

John stepped over, and Sam handed the pistol to him. John looked at it as well. And he seemed as puzzled as Sam was.

They moved on, though Sam saw John had holstered the new pistol. _Likely for later examination by Halsey._

They got to an intersection. One end headed of to an area marked 'Supplies', while the other led to an area marked 'Central control'.

"Fred, take Sam, Six and Will. Head for Supplies, and take back as much as you can carry. Kelly, Jun, Linda, Grace, you're with me. We head for Central control, and find out what's happened here."

Everyone nodded, and went with their respective groups.

Sam noticed, as they headed for the area marked supplies, that there were no bodies in this section. Nor any spare weapons. Nothing of these appeared along the way. Six crouched at some places, where the dust seemed thinner, but since there was nothing, they moved on.

They finally made it to the door marked Supplies. It was blown open, inwards. Six, not letting her guard down, took cover on one side of the door with Fred. Sam and Will took cover on the other side of the door. After a nod from Fred, they all went in.

And saw nothing. There were no supplies, no bodies, no casualties, nothing. Just a lot of holes in the wall, indicating a firefight had taken place here. Six kicked at the wall. "dammit. There has to be something here."

"I agree." Fred said. He then activated his com. "Chief, there's nothing here. No supplies and no casualties. The only thing worthy of note about this room is that there are a lot of Ricochet markings on the walls."

"Copy, Fred." The Master Chief answered. "Get back to the airlock. We'll catch up there."

Fred nodded, and they all moved back to the airlock. Sam wondered what John and his team had found in Central Control.

* * *

Kelly got unnerved the closer they got to Central Control. They had come across quite a few bodies. Most of them were human, and they all had markings that Kelly remembered. The markings of the United Rebel Front, the major Insurrectionist Group the Eridanus Rebels were a part off. They all were laid out in positions indicating they were defending Central Control. They all had only a single wound, a shot in the center of the head. Only a Spartan was capable of such precision.

And, to the best of her knowledge, no Spartan had dropped of the grid long enough to take care of the rebels like that. Not Black Team, which were deployed on the edge of Covenant Territory. They couldn't have been out here, this far from their assigned territory. And Grey team wasn't even focused on the Insurrection. They always went after Covenant targets. They may have dropped out of contact for over a year, now, but this was out of their assigned zone. And this wasn't their MO. Grey made a lot of destruction, sure, but they wouldn't slaughter civilians. Or bring down a tower onto a town. It unnerved Kelly to see so much destruction that could have been caused by a Spartan.

They then, finally, got to Central Control. The door was locked open, and a lot of blood was on the door's switch. Below it lay a Woman, black skin, about Sixty years old. Her eyes had rolled backwards, and a hole was between her eyes. Kelly crouched, slightly wincing as she did so, for it overstretched her chest muscles, which were still recovering from the sword strike.

She saw the body's hand was pointing at something. Kelly followed it.

And saw pieces of crystal. Kelly immediately tensed. The fragments were discolored, and smaller than a child's nail, but Kelly recognized them immediately.

They were the remaining Fragments of a Needler round.

"John. Over here."

John moved over, and saw what she was pointing at. He nodded. "So the Covenant was here. They're just a lot more Stealthy than in previous operations."

"But why take this many precautions to prevent discovery? They usually just blast anything that is human-made to smithereens. There were no forerunner artifacts here, and that's the only reason the Covenant have ever been careful."

"and besides, why keep the asteroid intact? Why not just blast it from Space?" Grace added. "This doesn't add up."

John nodded, but didn't comment anything else. They entered Central Control.

It was a mess.

The room was laid out with a central ring of consoles in the center, and more consoles against the wall. There was blood everywhere, and nearly every console was damaged beyond repair. In the center of that ring was a single chair, and it seemed to be a central 'throne'. In it sat a man. He had long hair, and seemed to be the leader of the rebels. Or he would have been, if he wasn't a skeleton with a few Flesh tatters on his bones. A picture of the man sat next to him. On the back of it was written, likely in the man's blood, the words 'Governor Jacob Jyles. Traitor, deserter thief and murderer. May he be burned in Hell forever, for abandoning his men and locking them out.'

"Gruesome." Jun said. "Even Six doesn't make a mess like that."

"Indeed." Linda said. "Who would do something like this? I mean, look at the man. He's been burned to the bone, and a live by the looks of it."

John moved to the throne. He checked the controls in the seats, but moved away after a second. Kelly and the others inspected the rest of the room. She was about to check what seemed to be the radar system when she noticed something: A foot sticking out from underneath the footspace of the console.

An Elite foot.

"Jackpot." she muttered. "Over here! Got something interesting." She pulled the Elite out. John helped her after a short moment, for it was quite heavy.

Kelly was surprised, to say the least. It was an Elite, for sure. And it wore basic Spec-Ops armor. But that's where the similarities between it and the standard Elite Combat Harness ended. It was in two colors, with a matte black covering most of the armor, and a bright yellow covering some of the other plates, providing a bright contrast. It's armor was also much thicker than normal Spec-Ops armor, to the point Kelly's fist was just as large as the chest piece. It's Helmet was also heavily... the word _Customized_ sprang to mind. It's HUD, when reactivated, started up with lining the HUD with Triangles, before each triangle pictured the view seen through the Eye-slits of the original Spec-Ops Helmet. The chest armor was full of holes, likely from a _lot_ of concentrated fire.

But to Kelly's surprise, it was armed with human weaponry. An Assault rifle lay in the footspace, along with some dusty spent shell-casings. And a magnum M6D pistol was attached to it's right thigh holster.

"What the hell?" Jun asked. "Some new class of Covenant soldier? Like we saw on the _Ascendant Justice_?"

"No." John said. He then lifted up the helmet. He tilted it, so the light shone on it differently.

Kelly saw the symbol seen on the Plasma Pistol John had picked up, marked on it beneath the first layer of armor.

"This is an entirely new group. Look at the armor. Though similar in appearance, it is far more durable than standard Covenant Armor. And more technologically advanced. And look at the armor. It must have taken a _lot_ of firepower to take it down. Far more than we have seen on the station so far. Combined with the fact that we haven't seen any of their corpses before on other ops, and the fact that most Covenant have an aversion to using Human weapons, I think we are dealing with a new group."

Kelly found herself agreeing with the Chief. But she still shuddered at all the firepower this Elite had absorbed before finally dying.

Then she got an idea, and hit the usual spots that released Elite armor. As usual, the armor fell off of it's chest.

And Kelly saw cybernetic implants. A lot of cybernetic implants. On the chest alone, she could see three implants, each located near vital organs. And the head itself was full of implants. The eyes were red from it, and in the jaw Kelly thought she recognized a Vocalizer. The ears had enhancement headsets in it's ears. And Kelly could name a dozen more if she truly wanted to. But she didn't waste the effort.

"Let's take it with us." Grace said. "Halsey will have a field-day with him. And maybe Fol can answer something, too."

Kelly nodded, and was about to grab the corpse, when Jun stopped her. "Don't worsen the injury. You won't hear the end of it from Six if you do. I'll take him."

Kelly nodded, and let Jun take on the Elite's corpse.

John nodded at them, and let the way out.

And then Linda, who was standing at the only console that was lit, spoke up. "Hey, there's a Chiroptera here. Likely the Governor's personal transport. We could use that to power the SlipSpace-drives. It was scheduled to get a new one, but the drives were never properly installed."

"And what's a Chiroptera again?" Jun asked, as he carried the corpse over his shoulders.

"A small stealth transport." Kelly explained. "Has the smallest Slipspace drives man has ever made. But they are too small to carry all of us."

Jun nodded. "Let's take it anyway. It might be of use in the term of Spare parts for the drives."

They all nodded, and set out for the hanger instead. Fred raised them halfway there. "Chief, there's nothing here. No supplies and no casualties. The only thing worthy of note about this room is that there are a lot of Ricochet markings on the walls."

"Copy, Fred. Get back to the airlock. We'll catch up there."

John turned to the others. "Linda, Grace, you two head for the Chiroptera. Dock it with the Gettysburg. Kelly, Jun, you go with me. We'll head for the airlock."

Linda nodded, and she and Grace headed for the hanger. John, Kelly and Jun made their way to the airlock. They arrived back there around the same time as the others. Six immediately headed over to the dead Elite. "Got some barbecue meat for me?"

"No, experimentation material for doctor Halsey and the AI's." Kelly answered. Kalmiya was still on the Gettysburg, working with Doctor Halsey to effectively work through all the new information. "want to join the stubborn bastard?"  
"No, thanks."

Fred turned to John. "Nothing worth noticing, sir. What did you find aside from a new class of Elites?"

"The rebel leader, skinned and burned alive, along with what I interpret as a warning." John showed Fred the pictures, and he shuddered as well. Kelly was glad she wasn't the only one freaked out by it. "Nasty. Your handiwork, Six?"

Six looked at the pictures as well. "Nah. Burn and skin alive, maybe, but not the text and photo." Six paused, and looked at the Elite again. "I have never encountered anything like it."

"Note it along the Heavies for HIGHCOM to examine. Ignore it for now." Six nodded, and everyone went for the airlock again.

They got outside to open space, and after a moment, Wilson arrived again. He picked them up, and they got back to the Gettysburg. After about fifteen minutes, they received word that the Chiroptera had docked as well. Jun carried the corpse to Halsey's lab, and Kelly decided to head for the Sparring Square.

She saw most of the other Spartans had already gotten there. Fred and Fol were sparring with Energy-Swords, while Will, Linda, and Grace were looking on, sitting on a support beam they'd moved into position, making it serve as a makeshift bench. Sam was serving as a referee for the match. Johnson and Stacker, followed by Dubbo, were just entering the room from the other side of the cargo bay. Six and John were nowhere to be seen. The others were likely with Whitcomb on the bridge of the Gettysburg.

Kelly moved over to the others, who were watching the match.

After a short while, John arrived as well, followed by the Wilsons. Tends to Rise followed close behind a few minutes later.

John replaced Sam as Referee, as Will challenged Fol again, this time also with Energy Swords. Richie moved to join the others on the makeshift bench, and Lena and Rise continued to stand, merely watching.

Sam headed out of the room, seemingly on another of his futile searches of Six. Kelly was about to call him back in a joking manner.

When Six entered the room through the same door as Sam was about to exit it. She brushed past him, and moved to the edge of the ring. Sam went back to the bench, sitting on the edge. Kelly saw Six go for her Energy-Swords, and she saw Linda tense.

But Fol then got Will in a locking of blades, and used Will's temporary immobility to kick him out of the ring, literally. Will stood up, and was about to enter, when Six stepped in first.

"My turn." Six said, and Kelly observed something happen shortly after.

Fol seemed to take a better stance, lower and more balanced, like preparing for a more skilled opponent. Six activated two Energy-Swords. Fol activated a second blade as well.

"Usual rules." John began. " _No_ killing or dismemberments, match only ends when opponent surrenders or is knocked out of the Square. Go!"

Six and Fol immediately went at it. But Kelly could see neither was planning on getting surprised by the other. Six kept a bit of distance, and Fol seemed to be keeping a low stance. They did nothing in the begin except exchange a few strikes at each other.

But, just as she was about to nudge Linda and ask what Linda was bothered by, Six went into a full barrage of strikes. She made a strike at Fol's head while simultaneously kicking at his stomach. Fol blocked the first and evaded the other, but Six kept coming at him, striking at both of his swords this time. Fol blocked them, and Fol seemed to fall down. Six went for him immediately, slashing at his hands to disarm him. Kelly noticed from the corner from her eye that Jun entered the room at that moment as well, and he moved to sit on the long bench as well.

But Fol rolled aside of the strikes, and jumped onto his feet. Fol then made multiple strikes at Six, each and every one of them a counter to Six' own strikes. They went at it like that for about five seconds when Six kicked at Fol's head, jumping upwards in order to reach high enough. As Six' kick landed, Six immediately kicked at Fol's leg as he stumbled. Fol fell down, and Six immediately jumped on top of him. She held one blade at his throat, and the other held high, ready to strike.

Fol nodded, and Six jumped off, letting him get up. Both deactivated their blades, and Six moved to sit back down on the bench.

John moved over to them, and was about to congratulate them, when Lena spoke from a distance. "You know, this would be the ideal moment for a family photograph. Like those you look back on when you're old and such."

"Lena, you don't need to take family photographs every time the family meets to it's fullest extent." Richie said, taking it up for the Spartans. Kelly looked at him, and was about to thank him.

When Lena got back with a retort. "Then why must we do that every time the family finally meets, huh? There is no logical explanation to it if you don't, dad."

Kelly smirked. Wilson, who had an annoying sense of humor over the past three days, was backed into a corner. He either had to admit the photo's weren't necessary, and never hear the end of it from his daughter, or stick with his story, and let the Spartans take a Family picture, and get revenge from the Spartans later on. Either way, Wilson was, to use Johnson's vocabulary, screwed.

In the end, however, he chose the option Kelly didn't expect.

He removed his Helmet, smiled, and turned to the Spartans. "Yeah. Unfortunately, she's right. It would only be appropriate if we took that picture. Come on, pose."

"Remove the helmets while you're at it." someone called from behind them. Kelly looked around.

Johnson had entered the room again, and was standing there with Stacker and Dubbo, smiling. Johnson stepped forward, and, to Stacker's and Dubbo's surprise, went to sit between Sam and Fred on the bench, provoking them some more. Kelly could understand their surprise. After all, no one would sit next to the person they were intentionally provoking unless they wanted a beating.

 _Or thought they could get away with it._

"I mean, come on. Of some of you, I haven't even seen what their face looks like. And from the looks on your visors, I'd guess none of you haven't even seen Six' face. Come on, let's get the family picture while we're here anyway. I don't see a reason why you'd regret it."

Johnson's reasoning was sound. They hadn't had a picture of themselves as a group since before the situation at Jericho VII. And those were mostly those for official propaganda shots, so one for their own uses was quite a good idea.

Most of the others seemed to agree, as Fred, Linda, Sam and Grace removed their helmets. Kelly did likewise, and after a moment's hesitation, Will and Jun did likewise.

Which left John and Six.

"Come on, you guys too." Johnson said. "I'm not gonna stop asking until you do. I am more stubborn than a Wilson in that regard."

"And it's true." Richie said. "I can attest to that."

John seemed to hesitate, but after a moment, to Kelly's relief, removed his helmet as well.

Which left Six.

"Come on." Richie said. "I don't bite. Fol might, but I won't."

"Very funny." Six said sarcastically. "But the last one that saw my face up close was... let's just say a _corpse_ after a few minutes."

"I ain't scared of that." Johnson said. "And you know what scares me, so out with it."

"Out with what?"

Riche, catching on, asked the question. "What dream of your life do we need to threaten if we want you to remove your helmet and get onto the picture."

"I never said I objected to the picture. I object merely to the fact I have to remove my helmet."

Johnson and Richie wanted to continue on, but Lena stepped between the pair, distracting them. "I don't mind that. All I want is to give you guys something to be remembered by."

Kelly looked at Six. She swore she saw Six stiffen up by the mention of the word 'remembered'. Kelly made a note to ask her about that later.

But Six moved a bit more to the center of the group, and crouched down so she'd fit in. Kelly and Linda moved to sit beside her, flanking her on either side, while everyone else sat on the bench, with John, Sam and Fred standing behind Will, Grace and Jun.

Lena smiled, and grabbed a Chatter to make photo's with. To motivate the Spartans to smile, she said this: "Think of your best achievement in life, be it a good kill, a girl saved, or a weapon forged."

Most of the Spartans smiled at that. Six, in a seeming moment of pride, hefted her painted grenade launcher with one hand, and unsheathed her Kukri with the other. Kelly and Linda did likewise. Sam, like the strong and joking man he was, hefted both his minigun and his rocket-launcher above his head, one in each hand. Will and Fred each grabbed a knife, while Jun just looked through the scope of his Sniper Rifle. Grace mockingly threw an inactive frag grenade in the air. John just threw his shoulders around Sam and Fred. All of them seemed to smile.

Lena's smile grew bigger, and she clicked the button. After a moment, she grabbed a cable from her jacket, and plugged it into the ship. Cortana and Kalmiya immediately appeared. Before either could utter a word, Lena immediately talked away. "Here, a photo of what's left of Blue Team. And I didn't even have to bribe them with candy."

Kalmiya immediately seemed to smile, while Cortana took on a frown. "How the hell did you manage to do that?" both asked at the same time. Lena smiled. "I let the smooth Johnson do the work, backed up by dad."

"Impressive." Kalmiya said. "Did they bribe the Spartans with candy?"

before Lena could respond, Halsey called over the com. "Kelly, could you come over here, for your final medical examination involving the wound on your chest. I need to check on something."

Kelly sighed, and replaced her helmet onto her head. "I'd better get going, then. I'd guess I'll be back soon for the action."

"We'll prepare another Oathsworn for you." Linda called jokingly from behind her. Kelly turned around, and raised a finger at Linda. It only seemed to encourage Six, though. "Can I at least get a date first? Maybe even get Linda along with it?"

there was laughter behind her, and Kelly smiled as she left the area.

Time to get a doctor's permission, then.

* * *

Halsey was looking over the data from Halo again.

Halsey had been busy, along with Kalmiya and Cortana, to analyze all the files they had, on both the Forerunners, and, for Halsey's personal piece of mind, the S-III files and the Grave's vengeance files. She had analyzed a lot of the data, and had determined one thing: The Forerunners have been everywhere. The planet of the Star system-file inside Araqiel was filled with ruins of their cities, to the point that she suspected the planet was honey-combed with their tunnels, The rock from Sigma Octanus was filled with their glyphs. And Reach.

The cave-system inside Menachite mountain was built by them, as well as the ship in the Babd Catha Ice Shelf. In fact, the ship seemed to be headed _away_ from said cave system, and a track in Reach's surface indicated the ship had crashed back onto Reach before stopping at the Ice Shelf. Halsey knew for sure that, if she spent more energy into the effort, she would find at least a dozen more sites of their artifacts. And Fol could even confirm that another Forerunner Ship was at the Covenant's supposed Capital, High Charity. Halsey knew, however, that she had other priorities: Securing the Spartan-III's on Onyx, and destroying the Crystal. The Crystal had to be destroyed, for multiple reasons. The most urgent one was that the Covenant would soon find them here, and they couldn't travel through SlipSpace with the Crystal intact. It was draining all the energy from the drives, preventing them from charging enough to make a jump. It also emitted a lethal amount of radiation during SlipSpace, to the extend it would kill even the Spartans in about three days of exposure. It needed to be taken care of.

As for the Spartans, Halsey just set it as a personal goal, for once.

All of her life, she had spent too much time saving as many people as she could, by sacrificing a few to do so. But, with recent events, and the short group picture she had seen the Spartans take, she realized that she should have been attempting to save everyone, not offering a few to save many. As it had proven during the war, it only delayed the inevitable. And, with the posibility of more Spartans, she just couldn't ignore Onyx any longer.

Halsey looked up as she heard someone approach her from the hallway, and she expected Kelly to walk in begrudgingly. Good, for what Halsey was about to do on Onyx, she could use Kelly's speed. She would have preferred to take John as well, but Halsey knew that he was needed for their attack on the Covenant Command and Control station. Along with Cortana. It was for that reason Halsey had Cortana focus on their ship's systems and operations, instead of in Halsey's lab. Kalmiya was in a datachip, ready to be plugged back into Kelly's armor.

The person finally entered Halsey's office. And, to Halsey's surprise, it was Sarah, the civilian Freighter pilot and friend of one of the ODST's on the ship.

Sarah shut the door behind herself, and approached the doctor. And Halsey knew something was wrong. For one thing, her gait was different from what Halsey had seen earlier. Her steps were too precise, too big, and she moved with a goal in mind, something she hadn't done before.

And she was headed for Halsey.

"Hello, Dr. Halsey. How's everything going on the data?" Sarah asked, her voice seemingly innocent. But Halsey knew she wouldn't ask for the data unless she had a reason to ask. She always did have one, and Halsey had been able to determine it every time so far.

At the moment, though, Halsey had no such luck.

"It's going along rather well. Why do you ask?"

"Just curious. About how a crazy Doctor, who kidnapped children in order to make them child-soldiers augmented beyond recognition thinks."

Halsey was about to protest it, when she realized something.

Those specific details of the Spartan Program weren't known to the public, except to ONI personnel and a select few others. And yet this low-profile freighter pilot knew about it. Halsey was intrigued. "And why do you think I did that?"

sarah then started to smile. It wasn't a friendly one, though. More like a presidential candidate who is about to defeat and humiliate his most important political adversary. "But, Doctor Halsey, I never said I thought _you_ were the crazy doctor. Is there something on your mind, that makes you think you should take it like that?"

Halsey grimaced on the inside. There was more to this woman than she was initially led to believe. Not only had she the details of the Spartan program, but she had Halsey confirm her involvement in it herself, without Sarah having to do anything as drastic as Halsey initially expected.

 _Who was this woman?_

"Yes, there is. But let's talk about _you_ for a second. Wh-"

"Let's not get distracted here, doctor. Not with Kelly approaching fast. At least, I hope it's Kelly. After all, you made a lot of failed attempts at cloning people. Seventy five of them, in fact. Who knows if you ever succeeded?"

though she kept her expression neutral, Halsey was shocked. The only one who knew about the cloning were said ONI personnel and the Commander in Chief of the Office of Naval Intelligence, Vice Admiral Margaret Orlenda Parangosky. And Parangosky couldn't risk that those details could get out to the public, not even with the Covenant war. The blowback from it would give the propaganda people of the insurrection a field day, and national morale would drop deeper than ever, to the point that the UEG would possibly even be overthrown. Combined with the fact that the Covenant would pick on any advantage they could get their hands on, Humanity wouldn't stand a chance. And the Spartans themselves... Halsey couldn't even begin to _think_ about what could happen to them if their pasts got out to the public. No, Parangosky, for all of her arrogance and hubris, wouldn't have told something like that to an ordinary field agent.

 _So who was this woman with, then?_

"Who are you?" Halsey finally asked.

Before she could answer, Sarah turned around. She looked down the hallway, and Halsey followed her gaze.

Kelly was approaching from the end of the hallway. Sarah turned back to the doctor. "I will leave you two to be. As for who I really am, let's just say _Graves_ sends his regards. You'll understand that they _aren't_ kind, though." with that, Sarah exited the lab, passing kelly in the hallway and flashing the Spartan a smile.

And it knotted Halsey's gut. Graves hadn't just eliminated Halsey's other possible locations, he had managed to track her, and continued to do so.

All the way to the Gettysburg.

Halsey didn't know why she suddenly felt that the timeframe for what she need to do had been lowered. Graves didn't seem the kind back then that would hunt someone down and kill them, not even for revenge. But a lot had still happened between now and the last time she saw him. The Covenant war could have drastically changed him. Whatever the case it was, Halsey didn't feel as safe as she did an hour ago. Least of all with that odd Elite Kelly had found.

Halsey had been perplexed by it the most. Aside from the observations John had made about it, it had a lot of previously unknown intel. The suit had been erased of most of the useful things, Halsey had still managed to recover a little bit. It was a member of what was called the Legionary Armada, the same name as the file Araqiel possessed about a Covenant mercenary group. But it didn't make any sense. Mercenaries usually don't have access to this much tech. And from what Halsey had read in the original files, the 'Legion' had to consist of over three _thousand_ ships. Surely the Covenant didn't allow mere mercenaries to carry this much equipment.

 _Unless the Covenant were unaware of them, or of how much they possessed._

But Kelly was approaching, and Halsey turned back to the task at hand. She composed herself again as she saw kelly enter the lab. Halsey gestured for Kelly to lay down, and the Spartan complied. Halsey opened up a few of the armor ports, and put in a few IV's and other drips. Including, not to Kelly's knowledge, a sedative that would knock the Spartan out for a couple of hours. More than enough time for Halsey to do what she needed to do.

More specifically, to get out of here, away from Graves' spy, and get to Onyx.

Kelly was about to ask Halsey something, but she could see the sedative was already taking effect. The Spartan slumped on the table after about 15 seconds. Good.

Halsey grabbed the Crystal and Kalmiya's datachip. She then opened her comlink. "Cortana, could you send Locklear this way? I would like to ask him something."

"Sure thing, doctor. I'll get right on it." Halsey nodded, and signed off. Halsey grabbed a duffel bag, put in Kelly's painted shotgun, Oathsworn, and about six belts of ammunition, with each belt having 6 shells for the weapon. She also grabbed an assault rifle, and put it in along with 12 ammo clips. She put them on the table, and put the Crystal in an empty ammo pouch.

 _Time to talk with locklear._

* * *

Sam was walking with John and Fred, in the aftermath of the duel between Six and Fol, when he noticed John wasn't really paying attention to where he was going. For one, he was walking really close to a pillar.

Sam smiled behind his visor. John was likely thinking about Kelly. During the past few days, the pair only had talked twice, and in both instances, others were around and listening as well. Sam knew both wanted a few moments of privacy to talk, even if they didn't admit it to themselves. So Sam, along with the subtle help of Linda and Six, was trying to get the two of them a private moment. In fact, Linda and Six were arranging such a moment right now, while Kelly was with Halsey for a final check-up, and Sam was walking with John in order to keep him clear of said area.

Fred came approaching from the other end of the corridor, and he keyed a laser at Sam's helmet. A notification appeared, indicating he had received a message. The line-of-sight laser made sure it wouldn't be intercepted by unknown parties, and it was handy. Sam read through the text one time, before deleting it real quickly.

 _I don't know what you all are planning for the pair, but I want in. I want the best for them just as much as the rest of us. Please._

Sam nodded at Fred, and gave him a discreet thumbs-up. Fred sagged his shoulders in relief, and joined them on their walk. After a moment, Sam opened a private co between the three of them, and attempted to socialize, trying to get John's attention. "So. Instead of a geeny's three wishes, I want to make three guesses. Is that alright with you guys?"

"Sure." Fred said. "But only if I get three as well."

"Depends on what we are guessing about." John said, confused. Sam smiled. John was either the bravest or the luckiest Spartan in existence. He had the most kills among them, the most successfully completed operations, and the most medals awarded among them. In short, Sam would say he was the best.

But he could be so emotionally and socially blind sometimes. Sam and the others always made a few private jokes about it among themselves. Provided John wasn't around of course. Fred and Linda were a few of those among them that knew the joke, and the other ones alive at the moment that knew about it.

"We are guessing about this: what is on John's mind?" Sam answered. He flashed John a Spartan smile, indicating he was joking. John, after a moment's hesitation, John returned it.

Fred patted John's shoulder. "Me first. Is it this?" Fred unhooked his Spartan Laser. "A red, hot, fiery death?"

John chuckled, so Sam took that as an improvement. "No. Not everyone likes to use a Spartan Laser non-stop, Fred. Though I do understand why you are so fascinated with it."

Sam looked at Fred, who was looking away. "Oh, really?" Fred asked. "And why am I so fascinated with it?"

John then took of his helmet. And Sam saw he was smiling from ear to ear. "You know why. Or do I need to ca-"

"Don't." Fred said quickly. "I'll shut up."

"But I won't." Sam said, looking at Fred this time. "Who is this 'red, hot and fiery death' you're all referring to?" Sam looked at Fred this time, and looked him in the eye. Fred turned away, and sam was confused for a slight second.

"Need her number?" John asked Sam. "It starts with a zero, then-"

"I said I'll quit, alright?" Fred said. "What more do you guys want?"

But it was too late for him, for Sam got it at that moment. "Oh, _that_ red. I'd guess you're quite grateful for Six' medical expertise, huh?"

"Oh, great. Look who's finally figured it out. Took you long enough."

"But I, to be honest, never expected it to be _her_. I thought it would have been Allison."

"No. Allison more like a twin sister. And with her death, I got a little low. Linda helped me recover from it, and we've been... let's just say that stuff's private."

Sam nodded. "Enough said. Now _I'll_ shut up."

but John, bent on taking revenge for that awkward question asked earlier. "Now that Fred's... _friendship_ is out in the open, let's talk about _you_ , Sam."

 _Oh, Fuck._ "Yeah. With my mouth, I've had it coming, didn't I?"

"Yep." Fred said, and he moved to flank Sam on the other side, effectively putting him between the two Spartans. "Now, John. Let's talk about who _Sam_ likes."

"Short, filthy, has a tendency to get close,-" John started.

"Poor choice of words, John. _Very_ poor choice of words." Sam interrupted.

"Has a passion for flames, likes to cook stuff. You've already seen her."

Fred seemed confused at that last bit. "Until the last two, I thought you were referring to Allie. When did I see her?"

"At the Sparring Square. Put two and four together, and you get?"

Fred paused, before looking up in surprise. "Six? The Three? What did she do to attract your attention?"  
"Just stop, please." Sam said. He really wasn't in the mood for this. But then again, he had it coming.

"Well, let's just say Sam talked his way into a date barely three hours after we met." John said. "And yes, he wasn't drunk or enjoying the sight of an explosion. _He was aware._ "

"A date? Smooth, Sam, very smooth. Can I get some tips on how to do that as well?"  
"I was-...I-... Oh, Fuck." Sam knew he was screwed. John had all the excellent opportunities to make his life miserable, and was taking every single one of them.

"And that ain't the best part." John said. "I got something amazing: Sam has provoked an argument."

 _When this is over, I'm gonna sit down with Johnson and his marines, take a beer, and learn every single curse they can teach me._

"No way!" Fred said, and turned back to Sam. "Sam, the big friendly bear?"

"Yep. Linda even has a recording of it."

Sam paled. _No_.

"Oh, I'll download a copy of that, and put it next to our group picture we just took. Just think of all the possibilities for later generations!"

"When this is over." Sam said menacingly, though all three of them knew he was joking. "I'm going to get you two in one room with me, lock the door, and have a _really_ good sparring match with you guys."

"Oh, we'll risk it. But-" Cortana then interrupted Fred.

"Spartans, Dr Halsey is leaving the Hanger in the Chiroptera. She's taken Kelly with her."

That was enough motivation to get them all going. John sprinted to the observation deck instead, knowing that they were too far away to stop Halsey in the hanger in time. Sam and Fred were on his heels.

They arrived on the Observation deck in under two minutes. Jun and Grace were seemingly already there. The Civilian, Sarah, entered a moment after them. For some reason, despite her furious expression, she seemed pleased. They all were looking at the same thing.

A sleek Chiroptera, flying through the Asteroid belt, making it's way towards the edge of it. Sam could already see it would make it before the _Ascendant Justice/Gettysburg_ could catch up with her.

"Cortana, raise the Doctor." Fred said. "I want to know what is going on."

"Already tried, Fred. She's transmitting the UNSC code Three-Nine-Two, indicating she 'seemingly' has a priority mission."

So basically the doctor was telling them _Fuck You_. Great. The Chirpotera cleared the asteroid field, and after a moment, the ship was gone, jumping into SlipSpace.

"Cortana." John asked. "What did she take with her, besides a Spartan?"

"Kelly's personal weapons, ammunition, the files from CASTLE base, copies from our Halo data, and Kalmiya's datachip. The Cry- Oh."

"What?"

"This is interesting. Locklear currently has the Crystal."

John turned to the others. "Grace, find Locklear. Get the Crystal, before he does anything rash with it."

Grace nodded, and she left the bridge, running as fast as she could afford in these corridors. Sam looked at John. He must be going through hell at the moment. Even if he doesn't know it yet for sure himself, but he cared a lot more about Kelly than just being friends. Hell, if Sam had guessed correctly, they would likely have gone a lot further with it if either hadn't been busy fighting the war. And if either developed the guts to step up to the other of course.

Sam had little faith they would develop it on their own. That was why he, Linda, Six, and now Fred as well, were trying to give them a few private moments together. But, of course, it went wrong, with Halsey kidnapping Kelly. Linda and Six came sprinting to the observation deck. Six spoke first. "We heard. She's gone?"

"Yes." John answered. "Along with Kalmiya and the CASTLE files. They are armed though." "Good. They can both take care of themselves, so don't worry."

John nodded. But Sam knew that John still would, the stubborn bastard that he was. After a moment, John left the deck, with Sarah and Jun following soon after. Leaving Fred, Six, Sam and Linda alone on the deck. Sam decided to open up the new development for the group. "Well, that ruins their dinner plans. As for our attempts, Fred wants in. Any objections?"

none raised their hands. "Good."

Six turned to Fred. "In short, we were trying to get those two a private moment, since they never really got that the last few days. Linda and I were preparing a small room in the engineering section for them, while Sam kept the Chief distracted. Kelly was already taken care of, with her 'check-up' for Halsey. We were almost done when we were info-"

A shudder went through the ship, and Sam saw the others look around as well.

"Cortana, what's going on?" Six called over their com.

"An explosion in the medical bay." Cortana paused. "Locklear was there, with the Crystal. The drives are starting to charge again, indicating the Crystal is destroyed. Grace is nearly there, and she's been informed."

Sam looked back down towards the front of the ship, where said bay was located. "Have Grace look for any potential fragments."

"Already on it. Haverson's also on his way. But... Locklear didn't make it."

"Understood." Six said, her voice grim. "But with the Crystal destroyed, we can jump again, right?"

"Yes."

"Then have Whitcomb jump near the edge of the system. The Covenant aren't sitting still, are they?"

"No, they aren't." Fol said, as he walked onto the observation deck. "They are likely onto us already. I've spoken with Whitcomb. We're jumping to the Oort cloud near the Unyielding Hierophant, and we'll drop you off there, and wait until you give the signal."

"What's the uny- something, and why aren't you coming with us?" Linda asked.

"Unyielding Hierophant, the Command and Control station you're going to destroy. As for why I am not coming with you all, we're dropping you off, through SlipSpace, and the damage sustained during that would damage the hull. And since I have no vacuum-tight armor, I can't accompany you."

Six nodded, and left the deck. Sam and the others followed after a moment. They all headed for the officer's mess. They all gathered there, so Whitcomb could give them a final briefing. The only ones not present were Haverson and Grace, who were still gathering fragments from the Crystal. They were listening in, though.

Fol started the briefing. "I'll be short, for this doesn't require all that much explanation, and you will know most already. Your objective is to infiltrate the Covenant Command and Control station, designate 'Unyielding Hierophant'. You will accomplish this by exiting SlipSpace just as we pass through the approximate region. You will either make your own way there, or let Cortana's copy handle the response necessary to get you there. Once on board, you'll make your way to one of the ship's reactors, overload it, and get out if possible. We'll be waiting on the other side of a lunar body in the system as well. If you make it out, make your way there, and we'll pick you up. Any questions?"

None raised their hands. Whitcomb stood up. "Well, Spartans, Good luck. Let Operation: First Strike commence."

* * *

 **Here you go, the next chapter. Let's all wait and see what will happen. reviews are appreciated**

 **Gharst Omenlumin**


	5. Chapter 5

**I'm back. don't worry, the rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated. I'm sorry I haven't let anyone hear of me for close to a month, but, if I'm honest, I have been busy with the pup, school, and the fact I don't have a clue what I want to do for a job later on, and I have been searching for the last few weeks. Don't worry, I have had... assurances over the last few days, and I can write again. I even have the Epilogues (Nearly) finished.**

 **Now, read on, Legionairs**

* * *

Halo: First Strike Chapter 5

They all sat still in the Dropship, riding out the… bumpy ride in SlipSpace.

They had boarded the Armored Spirit, the one they had customized with armor from the Longsword's wreck, about five minutes ago, and they were flying in SlipSpace ever since. The ride was, to put it shortly, a disaster, and lethal for people without Mjolnir armor.

John made a headcount of the ones currently on Blue team.

Sam, designated Blue-02 for this operation, was sitting in the Leftmost prong of the DropShip, checking his weapons. He had brought along everything he could, from his rocket-launcher to his new minigun. John had faith that Sam could back anyone up on this operation, if need be.

Fred, Blue-03, was sitting in the gunner's seat of the Spirit, checking his armor. He was John's second in command for this op, and had brought all of his weapons along. Even the Energy Sword Fol had given him during his own run in the Sparring Square was stashed on Fred's right thigh. Fred also had two combat knifes, a Spartan Laser and a Battle Rifle, and was to provide backup for anyone further down the line.

Linda, Blue-04 for this op, was sitting next to Sam, was checking over her Sniper rifle again, Nornfang John heard she had called it.. John had stopped counting how many times she'd done that over the last three days, but it seemed to settle her nerves. John paid no more attention to it.

Will, Blue-05 at this mission, was sitting in the right prong, next to Grace. He was their Close-Quarter combatant, and was currently scraping his combat knifes as well. He seemed to be glancing at Six quite a few times. John had recently learned that he wanted to spar with Six during their stay on the Gettysburg, but he never seemed to be able to find her at the right moment. And it seemed he was expecting that either one or both of them would die on this op. John made a note to talk with him about his pessimism later on.

Six, for convenience's sake Blue-06, was currently sitting in the Pilot's seat, making sure their ride was as smooth as possible. Not that a small dropship would have a smooth ride in SlipSpace, but to Six' credit, the ride was smoother than John expected, to the point they could walk around if they had a proper handhold, and that they didn't have to shout in order to be heard. She was carrying her custom-painted Grenade launcher, coined 'Demon's Flame' by Sarah, and a DMR she had stolen from Fol, who had protested about it the whole way to the Dropship. John had the idea it was more to irritate Six than genuine protest, and didn't make anything of it. Six and Fol seemed to have settled the majority of their differences, and the fact Fol had saved the rest of Blue-Team even when he didn't need to seemed to have squelched the suspicions of everyone else.

Grace, Blue-07, was sitting next to Will in the right prong, checking on their demolition charges. John saw no outwards signs that Grace had anything on her mind, so he paid no special attention to her. Beyond the usual suspicion, of course. You couldn't let the Demolitions expert of the team run too loose, after all.

The Final member, Jun, with the callsign Blue-08, was sitting next to Linda in the Right prong, checking something on his datapad. John moved over to look. It seemed to be footage of Dr. Halsey working on the files John had seen her review on multiple occasions. Jun was pissed that he had let his guard down around the doctor, saying that he had accidentally revealed classified information about the Spartan-III program, which he and Six turned out to be members of. John wasn't too surprised about it, since they didn't have the armor of Spartan-II's, but he did admit he was surprised it hadn't be revealed. But there were other things in John's mind, however, that took precedence in John's mind.

Namely two things: Where the hell Halsey was taking Kelly, and what in hell that Elite was.

During their stay, Kelly had uncovered an Elite, and John was worried about it. He had seen that it was of another faction of the Covenant, and that it was a lot more skilled and organized than its mainstream counterpart. Furthermore, Halsey's initial medical examination, which Cortana had managed to snatch before Halsey encrypted it, showed the Elite had been augmented, giving it a lot more physical strength. To the point where even Sam had trouble defeating it, if they had encountered it alive. It also had a lot of implants, and John saw some enhanced its strength even more. Others enhanced the Elite's senses, like smell, hearing and sight.

But John couldn't think about any of that stuff at all. They were on a mission now, after all. And surely, they wouldn't encounter that Elite on the Unyielding Hierophant.

"Anyone ever had a ride this bad before?" he asked, to distract himself from his thoughts and to interact with the others.

"When we went down to Reach to defend the orbital generators." Fred answered. "Our pelican broke apart in orbit due to damage from Seraph fighters, and we had to bail out. Now _that_ was a rough ride. Not this near-smooth flying in SlipSpace."

"At least you had a dropship when you entered atmosphere." Six retorted.

"Wait, what?" Will said. "Then what did you enter Reach's atmosphere in?"

Six paused, and John looked over. She seemed to be enjoying the suspense. Finally, she looked at Jun. "You think I was merely using a turn of phrase when I said Jorge threw me off that Corvette? He literally picked me up, threw me out of the hanger, and let me fall down to the planet, with nothing but an M-Spec reentry pack to break the fall."

Everyone was silent, even Sam. And John wasn't surprised. Surviving a fall from high orbit, and just in Mjolnir armor at that, was a very impressive feat. Most of the others were likely silent, though, because it takes a crazy person to even _attempt_ a jump from that height. But they'd already established Six was crazy, so John didn't pay that thought any mind.

"Just for the record." Grace finally said. "You had _no_ parachute, _no_ drop-pod, and _no_ other means of riding the flight down to the ground?"

"Nope." Six said. "It was a mere fall from high-orbit. No big deal."

"And you wonder why I consider you insane." Jun said.

"Hey, _Jorge_ threw me off of the Corvette. Not that I wouldn't have jumped on my own, but still."

"that's my point. You voluntarily jump off of a spaceship to crash onto the planet below, and just shrug it off as a mere fall. You must have a hell of a disorder in order t just shrug that off."

"So what? Oh, and we're about to drop out, so brace yourselves."

"At last, you attempt to warn us before crashing." Sam said jokingly. "I was wondering when you were gonna start."

"ha-ha."

John got a better hold of the frame of the ship, and he saw the others do likewise. Linda had already reassembled her Sniper rifle, and John could see the others already had everything else secured to the seats, by magnetic straps. Soon enough, the hull seemed to vibrate intensely, before it stopped altogether. John got up from his seat, and looked through one of the multiple breaches in the outer hull.

And reeled back. Not three hundred meters from their position was a BattleCruiser, its hull so close John could touch it if he jumped out a bit and floated for a second. Not that he was particularly tempted to do so. He switched to the point-of-view of Grace, who was looking at the other side of the ship. Sure enough, a ship dominated the view on her side of the Spirit. But on her side it was an Assault Carrier, about thirty kilometers away from them.

"Cortana" John asked of the copy he had in his helmet. Cortana had explained on their departure that, due to a glitch, the Copy considered herself the real Cortana unless Cortana was around herself. John didn't want to unnecessarily upset it, so he adressed her like he adressed the real Cortana. "How many Ships are currently surrounding the station?"

"I count 278 ships on our Starboard side. On our Port side, I count 222 ships, along with the Unyielding Hierophant itself." Came the distorted voice of the copy. "The station itself is hailing us, but I have given the automatic response, using Static to cover up the name of the ship we originated from. They seem to be more worried about us as a navigational hazard, though, rather than a genuine threat. I have requested that they tow us towards the station for repairs. They have acknowledged, and have sent Phantoms to tow us there."

John nodded, though he was still busy processing it all. There wasn't a single fleet in existence that was large enough to stop the ships present here. Frankly, it was useless to even warn earth: all this fleet had to do was open fire, and the first salvo would decimate the planetary defenses. There wouldn't be a single ship left to strike back at this fleet. There was no more destructive force in this galaxy.

Sam seemed to read his mind. "I'm getting a deja-vu from this."

"Where?"

"Halo. A massive construct capable of destroying all sentient life in the galaxy. This Fleet, for all it's destructive power, can't rival _that_."

"Amen." Six said. "Phantoms approaching. Let's keep quiet until we actually _get_ to the station."

Everyone agreed, and kept quiet. They waited silently, as the Phantoms magnetically locked onto them, and dragged them towards the station.

Everyone agreed, and kept quiet. They waited silently, as the Phantoms magnetically locked onto them, and dragged them towards the station. After about thirteen minutes, John felt a slight bump as the ship was released. They hadn't had anyone posted near one of the holes out of a fear, bordering on Paranoia, that they would be spotted. After about three more minutes of waiting, they had enough of it, and Six opened the hatch. They all got out into a fairly empty hanger.

While it was filled to the nock of it with vehicles, ranging from mere Ghosts to Deutoros type Scarab tanks. It seemed to be a service hanger, placed to patch up as many Covenant vehicles as possible. There were also quite a few Huragok present, with their Dropship placed in a line of Dropships waiting repairs. There was, however, no combat personnel to be seen anywhere. Therefor, John referred to it as 'fairly empty'.

They were also about fifteen meters above the ground when they jumped out. They were held aloft by an anti-grav beam the Covenant always seemed to be fond of. John looked down. It seemed clear for now, just a few Grunts that were pushing a large Plasma coil. And they could be easily avoided.

John jumped down.

He hit the ground with a soft thud, right behind the Grunts. They turned around and looked at him.

And promptly died as two knifes suddenly appeared in the tops of the Grunts' skulls. John didn't even have the chance to look up before Six landed in front of him in a crouch. She grabbed the knifes from their corpses, and, after shaking the blood and brain tissue off, sheathed them again. The others all landed right next to her soon after.

Sam looked at the Grunts, then at Six. "Can you make less of a mess next time? I'd hate to clean it up."

"You don't have to clean up here, so stop whining."

"Amateur." Jun muttered. Six turned to him. "I know." she said, satisfaction evident in her voice. "I've been trying to teach him the concept of Stealth, but he seems incapable of actually applying it."

"I was referring to you."

"Ouch. That hit me in the heart."

"You have one?"

"Yes. It's merely ice-cold."

John shook his head, and made it to the door without further trouble. He saw a dataport for Cortana's chip, and inserted her into the system, trusting the others would cover him long enough for what needed to be done.

"I'm in." she said. "I've downloaded the station's schematics, and have downloaded valid reactor codes that will initiate a meltdown of the reactor. Unfortunately, they have to be put in remotely. And the nearest reactor is five kilometers away, more to the center of the station."

 _Figures_. "Can you guide us from within the station's systems?"

There was a short pause. "Yes, though I have to make more copies of myself. Do you mind?"

"No. Do it. And do take care of yourself in there." the Chief yanked the chip back out, and, after ensuring Cortana was still in the system, put it in a pouch of his armor, so the real Cortana could inhabit it again when this was over. A door opened next to them, and Cortana's holographic avatar, slightly distorted due to a small glitch in the copy, guided Blue Team in. John and the others followed, with Six guarding their rear. They moved this way for about five hours, with each of them following Cortana's hologram, leading them through the station for hours. They then came to a sudden stop before a sealed bulkhead. It didn't open.

"Strange." Cortana said. "This bulkhead is welded shut from the other side, and there is no mention of this repair in the logs. Likely a new fix. Providing alternate route through... here, a Huragok passage. Be aware, at the other end, there is large open space."

Linda took on a straighter stance. "There aren't supposed to be 'open spaces' in a space station of this size. The station's superstructure shouldn't be able to support the resulting pressure." Linda sounded confused.

"See for yourself in about five minutes." Cortana said, her voice emotionless.

They all entered the Huragok passage, and followed Cortana's instructions. Sure enough, after five minutes, they emerged in a large open space, which, to John at least, resembled a Covenant equivalent to an Atrium.

And it was huge. It was about a hundred meters in height, and was two hundred meters long. It had multiple buildings inside, along with even streets and a small garage in the distance. John could also make out a large temple about fifty meters from their own position.

But what drew John's attention were two things: Water, and the power conduits. The water, because it flowed in all directions, backwards, sideways, and even upwards. Evidently, the Covenant had complete control over the Gravity in the room. The power conduits, because they emitted a bright light, and seemed to just be exposed: not traveling down cables, but actual gigantic, transparent tubes which could be traversed. They were fifteen meters in diameter.

The others exited as well. Jun seemed to be examining the area as well. "Sir, this area is full of good Sniper permissions. Request permission to separate from the team and find a place to cover you guys from."

John looked briefly around. It would indeed be handy if they had someone that could cover them. This room was quite large, after all.

 _But where one is good, two are better._

"Blue-04, Blue-08, you two go your own ways. Find good Sniper positions, and cover us as we cross the terrain. Cortana, what building is closest to our objective?"

"It's underneath that temple, accessible through a Huragok passage that leads straight there. You should also note, there's a large window near the far right corner of this large chamber. It leads to a vehicle bay where the ships are intact."

"An escape from here." Sam said. "Smart. Cortana, how thick is that window? I'd like to use some explosives here..."

"But we need to keep enough to penetrate the Window." Grace finished. "I don't want to be caught with my back pressed to my 'escape window'."

"I suggest we use the antitank mines we've brought along." Cortana said, referring to the LOTUS antitank mines Fred was currently carrying. Sam and Grace were currently carrying too many explosive as it is, so he had Fred carry some of their load. Merely a countermeasure in case a lucky shot hit one of their explosives, so it wouldn't take down the entire team if one of them went. "That should be enough to blow the window open. Use everything else at your own leisure."

John nodded. Linda and Jun went their own way. After about a minute, both lighted their acknowledgement lights. John gestured that they all should go in pairs, and that he and Six would go first, that Fred and Sam would be next, and that Will and Grace would be last. Everyone nodded.

After a count of three, he and Six sprinted ahead. They crossed the large street, and moved onward, until they were at the pillars of the temple. They immediately stopped there, as Six seemed to stiffen. Then she came to a full stop, seemingly just aiming at one of the pillars. John did so as well, aiming at one of the shadows.

When it moved.

Linda was leading them through a long set of corridors, her mind set on the ideal hiding place for the Sniper pair.

After a while, she found what she was looking for: an elevator.

They stepped in. After a short moment of hacking from Cortana, they went up until Linda signaled them to stop. Jun looked at her quizzically, but didn't say anything. Linda didn't mind, and removed the top hatch of the elevator cage. She climbed up, and held out a hand to help Jun up. After a second he took it. Linda looked around. They were currently aligned with none of the floors. They were, however, perfectly on level with one of the power tubes. One that circled the entire chamber. She took place on one of the cross-conduits, and gestured for Jun to take a similar position about fifty meters ahead. Jun complied wordlessly. After about a second, he lighted his acknowledgement light, and Linda did so as well a second later. They waited for a few seconds, and, after seeing John and Six run across the street, fired her first shot at an Elite that was about to spot the running pair.

Linda had chosen this spot for multiple reasons, from the moment she had entered the chamber. First, the light of the Power tubes would perfectly camouflage them, along with the shadow the cross-conduit created. Second, she had a grand-stand view of the entire chamber. And third, she would be able to cover them the entire way. Jun was in a similar position.

Then Jun fired two more shots, and she saw a pair of hunters fall down on a rooftop. "I'm two up on you, lone wolf."

"Oh, don't worry. I'll catch up."

and so it continued, with Jun and Linda having a contest of who could hit the most targets while covering the others of Blue team at the same time. At the end of the first run, it was 17-to-12 in Linda's favor.

"Impressive." Jun said as John and Six entered the temple. They started at the beginning of the run again. "But now comes roun- wait!" Jun started to aim at the temple again. Linda looked as well.

She could only see a glimpse of it, a mere shadow that took cover behind a pillar, but from the corner of her eye, she saw Jun tense up. "What is it?"

"Trouble." Was all he said, as he continued aim at the Temple. Linda started to do likewise.

After all, if a Spartan referred to something as trouble, it was wise to pay attention. It was something she'd seen many times, the most recent among them the Flood Containment facility on Halo.

Six was about to sprint through the pillars of the temple, when she smelled something. And she immediately stopped. She had smelled this scent once before, a smell that had emitted from a bunch of dead civilians in New Alexandria on Reach. One that wasn't human in origin.

And one that was always accompanied by a horrible creature. She came to a full stop. John did so as well. He was looking at the same shadow she did. When it moved.

"What is it?" the Chief asked. "What do you see?"

"More like: what do I smell?" Six immediately answered in a whisper. "And what I smell is piss."

"Piss?"

John looked at her confused. He obviously never encountered these soldiers before. "Do you know what a Brute is?"

"No. what are they?"

"Large, furry apes. Intelligent enough to fulfill the same role as Elites, but they are physically much stronger. They are prone to berserk, and like using Spikes and blades."

"and how do you know they are here?"

"Simple: in territory they consider their own, they piss everywhere. And this smell" she gestured around with one hand "is Brute piss."

John nodded, and he held his weapon tighter. "Any tips for someone who never encountered any before?"

"They're physically the toughest members of the Covenant, only bested in strength by Hunters and Sam. They're prone to berserk and fight at close range, so try to down them quickly by headshots. If they holster their weapons, run like hell, firing at it all the way. If one gets hold of you, lets just say I'll see you in hell. Oh, and watch out for large hammers. They're fond of them."

John nodded, and slowly stepped forward. Fred and Sam were approaching now as well. They slowed, however, when they noticed John and six had barely moved. Before either could say a word, Six turned, and said a single word. "Brutes."

Fred seemed puzzled, but Sam immediately stood straighter, and holstered both of his weapons. He took on a straighter stance. He obviously remembered their encounter with Brutes and their Chieftains from the Ship-breaking yards in Aszod, Reach. Six gave Fred the same summary of them as she'd given John, and they waited in the threshold of the temple, waiting for Grace and Will to finally arrive. After half a minute, they did. Six repeated the summary, and they all slowly moved forward. Then Six's motion sensor showed a single contact, and everyone stopped. The blip disappeared instantly, but Six knew it was there. And a dozen others likely with it as well. She turned to the others. "Want to start the party before they can? We have to fight them anyway."

The others all seemed wary of that option, but John, in spite of it, nodded. "Ring the doorbell." Linda and Jun lighted their acknowledgement lights as well, indicating they still had their backs.

Six nodded, grabbed her grenade launcher, and launched a grenade down the line of pillars. It exploded, and Six was satisfied when she heard a few weird howls of pain coming from them. But a lot of the creatures emerged from behind them, about twelve of them, outnumbering them two-to-one. All looked angrily at them.

Or, more specifically, at her.

It was a good thing she liked challenges.

The beasts charged at her, and Six, knowing it was no use up close, dropped her grenade launcher. She instead grabbed her energy swords, which she had taken with her aside from her 'Demon's Flame' and DMR. She activated them, and met their charge head on.

Four of the creatures headed for her. The others all headed to the other Spartans. Six jumped up, and threw her swords at two of them. One was impaled in the head, and died instantly. The other attempted to sidestep it, but it still hit the creature in the shoulder. Six saw it fall down. The other two, however, still came charging at her.

Six grabbed her combat knifes instead, and met their charge head-on. She jumped just as they were about to reach her, letting them pass underneath her. They tried to come to a halt in time, but they still skidded a few meters. They turned to her...

and one was immediately forced to duck, as one of Six' knifes flew at what seemed like light-speed towards it. It was still struck in the head by it, however, and it howled in agony.

Six immediately turned to the other, knowing that turning one's back to a live Brute was a mistake one only made once. It was nearly in striking distance. Six got a better grip on her Kukri, which she still had in her hands. The Brute came at her with a weapon she had seen before: a Jiralhanae Spiker, which was their equivalent to a SMG. It fired lethal spikes, and had to blades mounted to the underside of the weapon. The Brute swung it at her like a blade, like the weapon couldn't fire lethal spikes at all. Six blocked it with her knife, and then, before the Brute could pull his hand back, stabbed it in the hand, making it drop the weapon. The Brute pulled it's hand back in pain as Six pulled her knife back out of the hand. Six, using the temporary reprieve to her advantage, immediately kicked at the Brute's legs, making it stumble. And, to Six' surprise, it turned it's back to her as it did so.

Six immediately stabbed her knife into the back of the Brute, aiming for the spine. She hit it perfectly, and the brute fell to the ground in agonizing pain. Six grabbed it's Spiker, and fired a Spike into it's head to end its life.

She then turned to the other two Jiralhanae that were still standing, the one with her other combat knife in it's face, and the one with one of her Energy swords in it's shoulder. The former had managed to pull the knife out, and was just throwing it to the ground. The latter was, along with it's weapon slung over said shoulder, pinned to a pillar by Six' sword. It was no immediate threat.

Six turned to the former, and raised the Spiker. She saw the Brute was finally realizing it's 'prey' was still alive, and started to berserk towards her again. Six fired until the Brute went down, which was surprisingly after only a few shots. Six inspected the weapon. It was nothing special, not dissimilar from the Spiker she had seen on Reach. And yet, the weapon seemed a lot more effective than back then. Why?

Six ignored it for the moment, and turned back to the final one, the one pinned to a pillar.

Which was no longer pinned to a pillar, and instead a mere centimeter from her face, it's jaw open in an attempt to bite her.

Having no other choice, Six swung the blades of the Spiker up at the Brute's face to make it take more distance from her. It was struck right across the face, and Six followed up on the last attack with a punch at it's wounded shoulder, where the Energy Sword was still embedded. The Brute howled out in pain, and Six, knowing the wound was sensitive, pulled out her energy sword from the oversized gorilla.

The Brute sank to it's knees, and was about to howl out even more. Six didn't give it the chance to do so, however, and sank her energy sword into it's head.

Six turned to the others. The fight was seemingly already over. The Master Chief was standing over a Brute, and firing a burst into it's face to ensure it was dead. Fred was getting up, and shaking a bit of blood from his own combat knifes as he did so. He picked up his Spartan laser, which he had apparently dropped during his own fight with the Brutes. Will was helping Sam tackle a final Jiralhanae, which was already bleeding from multiple places, and Six could see actual indentations in it's fur and skin where Sam had punched it. Six was surprised to see it was a Chieftain. A shot from a Sniper rifle permanently put it down. Six couldn't tell if Jun or Linda had fired the shot.

But there was no sigh of Grace.

Six picked up her other combat Knife and backup Energy sword where they'd dropped, and started looking for her. On her way, she found her discarded Grenade Launcher, and holstered it across her back. And, not five meters away, she finally saw their demolitions expert. And Six wished she hadn't.

Grace's back had been ripped open, likely from a Brute Shot, which was a simple Grenade Launcher that propelled the grenade at a tremendous speed towards it's target. It had ripped through Grace's shield, and a second shot had blasted her chest armor apart, and had nearly ripped through all the way to her back. She lay face-down on the floor, nearly torn in two from the chest down. Six popped open the back-panels of her armor, and exposed the power core of her shields. She typed in the overload command for the power core, ensuring it would explode after a certain amount of time. She set it to fifteen minutes.

She got up, and moved with the others further inside the temple, the others already having noticed Grace was gone.

She looked back to the entrance of the temple. It was open and, despite the debris caused by the battle from a few seconds ago, very exposed. And if any other members of the Covenant were to spot it and try to investigate, Linda and Jun couldn't hold them away forever.

Six grabbed her grenade launcher, aimed for the roof, and fired an explosive round.

The round hit the ceiling, and as a result, a lot of rubble came down, and nearly all of the pillars that had stood at the front of the temple collapsed. After a minute, the way into the temple was blocked by debris.

 _Good. That'll slow 'm down._

Six ran a bit to catch up with the others. They were approaching what appeared to be a Huragok's hatch, which, according to Cortana's instructions, would lead them straight to the nearest reactor. Six got in last, guarding their rear.

They crawled for another ten minutes before they came at the end of their passage, about twenty meters below the temple. Six looked around as she emerged last.

The reactor itself was huge, to the point that it went through the roof of their current room, which already seemed about a hundred meters in height. The reactor itself was in their section, shaped like a giant pylon, surrounded by circular catwalks, with a glow coming from the center of the pylon.

And it was a very bright glow, as Six already had polarized her visor to it's maximum setting, and still she was nearly blinded if she looked at it directly.

The reactor itself rumbled a lot as well, so Six doubted anyone would hear it if she shot any guards that headed their way.

John and Fred moved over to the reactor. John raised his com. "Cortana, what do we need to do to give you direct access to this reactor?"

Six ignored the initial conversation as Cortana's copy led John through the steps. She surveyed the immediate area. It was clear for the moment, but Six was sure at least a few guards were still walking around out there. She aimed outwards towards the walls, where she saw were a lot of doors, most of which were likely elevator doors.

Then she heard something interesting coming from John and Cortana's conversation. "I can put the meltdown of the reactor on a timer, letting you guys have more time to get to a safe distance. It'll h-"

"Cortana" Six interrupted. "the fleet surrounding this station could jump at any moment. Initiate the meltdown _now_."

Cortana briefly looked at the Chief, but when he nodded, Cortana let out a sigh. "Done. The process itself is started. You have approximately 15 minutes until the reactor goes critical. I recommend an immediate withdrawal."

all of the Spartans still alive nodded, and Six led the way to one of the elevators. She stopped only once on the way, and that was because she spotted a Jackal coming up on them for it's patrol route.

Six still managed to arrive first, and she hit the hologram that she assumed would call an elevator. Indeed, after less than three seconds, one arrived.

And a Elite Ultra and a Zealot were looking incredibly surprised to see five of the demons. They were gunned down in less than a second.

Six and the others stormed in, and after John stepped in last, the doors closed and the lift shot upwards.

Cortana's avatar appeared on a holographic display on the elevator. "I'm currently manning... maanniiiing..."

The elevator jerked to a stop for a second, and the lights dimmed. For a second Six thought the copy had been compromised. But then the elevator started moving again, and the lights came back on. Cortana's avatar reappeared again, though this time it was heavily distorted.

"I'm... Sooooryyyy. Haaad... tooo... maaeeke... moooree... coppyyes... got over... Whelmed... Huuurrry...Caaan't... Hold out... much.. Longer..."

The Elevator stopped again, but this time the door opened. They were back in the large open space of the station, right above the Temple, on a large landing pad.

And on that landing platform were dozens of banshees.

"Jackpot." John said. "Fred, take Sam and Will, and head for the window. Blow it open. Six, you're with me. We're going to pick up Linda and Jun, before this station blows." as if to clarify how little time they had, the power conduits started to grow brighter, and the water spread across the large room started to boil.

Six got the hint, and jumped into a banshee. She lifted off, and started searching for them.

There was a large boom down below, and for a moment, Six suspected Cortana's timeframe was off.

But then she looked down, and saw there was no cause for concern. The power core of Grace's suit finally went up, and since they had left her with her explosives, it caused quite the light flash. When it cleared, the temple and the surrounding buildings were reduced to rubble, and the buildings next to those all had a layer of sooth and ash. _Good, that would please her and Sam quite a bit._

But Six, in the meanwhile, still had trouble locating Jun and Linda.

She decided to follow the power conduits, as they'd provide a good view of the surrounding area. She followed it for a minute, without success, and the timer was running low, with only about ten minutes to spare. She was about to call out to the Chief for instructions...

when her Banshee suddenly gained weight, and both her left and her right side slightly listed. She opened the canopy, expecting to see a pair of Elites up there, ready to contest her Banshee. And, to her Surprise, Linda and Jun were holding on to the wings, holding out their magnum pistols at her. They holstered them after a second.

"No free rides!" she yelled at them. "Can't you tourists know the Uber taxi system is outdated nowadays?"

"Yes." Jun said. "but the company here's better."

"Coming from the only man of us three, that's no surprise." Linda said.

Six sped towards the window. She opened her com channel. "Chief, I've got them. Head for either me to lighten the load, or the window, and help Fred blow it open. I'll catch up."

"I copy." the Chief said. "I'm on my way to you. Tell Linda to be ready to jump."

"I'm ready." Linda said.

After about a minute, with a little over seven minutes left on their counter, the Chief called ahead. "Ok, NOW! Jump!"

her left wing lifted a bit, as Linda jumped off her banshee. And Six saw John's banshee catch her immediately. Her load slightly lifted, Six headed for the window at a much faster pace.

"Chief, Slight problem. We detonated the LOTUS mine, but the window is holding. Sam is placing his remaining charges, but he's saying it ain't gonna be enough to break that window."

Six sighed. "I've said it before on the _Autumn_ , and I'll say it again: We need to leave the ship/station _before_ we destroy it, not after!"

"Six, Shut up." Sam said. "I thought you liked fire."

"yeah, when I'm the one making it. Not when it's gonna engulf me."

"There's no pleasing you, is there?"

"Oh, there is, but you guys not following my advice is starting to piss me off."

Sam just sighed, and shut down the Com channel. Six saw John had gained a lead in the meantime. He had already arrived at the window, and was dismounting from his aircraft. Linda was doing so as well.

Then Six had an idea. "Sam, just drop those charges there, and get the _hell_ out of the way."

Fred answered this time. "Why? What are you planning?"

"Let's just say it's gonna get loud."

She then turned to Jun. "On my mark, jump off _away_ from the window."

"Sure."

Six then accelerated her her Banshee to the fastest it could go, and fired all the guns on the craft. She aimed at the window.

Or, to be more precise, the explosives left in front of it by Sam.

A hit from her Fuel-Rod gun sent the whole package sky-high, and when the smoke cleared, she saw the window now had definite cracks into it.

But it still held.

No matter.

"Now!" Six said, and sure enough, Jun jumped off, allowing her to accelerate to much faster speeds.

After a second she hit the window at full throttle, and it shattered. The window blew, and, since the vehicle bay was open to the vacuum of space, everyone of the Spartans, including the still falling Jun, was pulled into the new hole.

It also wrecked Six' banshee, and she jumped out before it could explode. She drifted towards a Phantom Gunboat, and got in through the only way she could: the lower hatch.

She walked over towards the cockpit, settled in, and activated all the controls. She placed a waypoint for the others to indicate the gunboat as their escape vehicle, and maneuvered the thing so the others could get in quickly.

Sure enough, they got in after about 4 seconds. She exited the repair-bay, and sped away, heading for this system's moon. She looked at her counter again.

 _04:32:99. they still had a bit of time. They might just even make it!_

Then, unexpectedly over their com, the tune sounded. Olly Olly Oxen Free. Six gave the proper response, and before she knew it, Whitcomb answered. "Nice work, Spartans. Head for the dark side of the moon, and we'll be there. Transmitting coordinates."

Sure enough, after a moment, Six received the proper coordinates. "Yes, Sir. We're on our way."

Six flew to the moon as fast as she could, and after a minute, she could indeed see the _Gettysburg_ waiting there, modified with a lot of Covenant weaponry, shielding and other technology.

But only the _Gettysburg_.

"Where the hell's _Ascendant_ _Justice_?" Six asked.

No one on the gunboat could give an answer.

Sam and the others sprinted to the bridge, and they all were out of breath when they arrived at the Bridge. And Sam was about to salute, when he noticed something. The Admiral wasn't present, and neither was Lieutenant Haverson.

Sam looked around. The only ones present on the Bridge were Fol, Johnson, Stacker, Dubbo, Sarah and Cortana, who had her avatar projected from a data pedestal.

"Where' everyone else?" he asked.

Fol turned around from staring at the stars. "The Wilsons are down in the cargo bay, ensuring our 5028 Huragok are settled in. As for the admiral and the Lieutenant." Fol paused, his voice heavy. "See for yourself. Cortana, please show the feed from clarion Spy drone three."

Cortana complied without a word, and sure enough, it showed _Ascendant_ _Justice_ , speeding away.

Towards the _Unyielding Hierophant_ , and the rest of the 500 ship fleet.

"Oh, no." Six said.

"What the hell's the admiral doing?" John asked.

Cortana answered this time. "He's sacrificing himself so the entire fleet gets destroyed. Hang on, I'm raising him now."

Cortana halted for a couple of seconds, and later, on the second view screen, Whitcomb appeared, standing on the bridge of the _Gettysburg_. "Ah, Spartans. I was afraid I wasn't able to say a proper goodbye."

"Sir, how are you planning to get the entire fleet to blow? There's no way you can take them all on with a single carrier."

"I know, Sierra 104. Which is why I am deploying a bit of trickery." Whitcomb activated something from a remote, and a hologram appeared in the palm of his hand.

It was a virtual replica of the Crystal. "I'm gonna insult their honor, lure them all closer to the station, and take as many of them down with me as I can." he said. "Good luck, Spartans. And remember, you are all worth more than any frigate or Super-carrier the UNSC has."

before Whitcomb could close the channel, Fol stepped forward. "Admiral, Among my people, for people who go to battle, even though they know for sure they're gonna die, we often say a praise to them. Allow me to do the same."

after a moment's hesitation, Whitcomb nodded. "That would be nice to hear. Please, go ahead."

Fol nodded, and took off his helmet, and put it into his left hand. His right went up in a mockery of a human salute. "'I serve no master. I serve no God. I live within your beating heart. I beat, I bruise, I bleed and die. And only you can tell me why."

Fol paused, and changed his position, now his left hand up in a salute and his right holding the helmet. "When pain's got you down below, I'll be there to let you know: I'll never leave your beaten hide. I'll stand beside you all the time. My name is will, I am your guide."

Fol now lowered his hands, and put down his helmet. "For know this now, and forever more, never more you'll be alone.'" Fol finished, and he put his helmet back on. "I respect you highly admiral. If you believe in a god, may he guide you to a heaven. If you don't, make sure you send as many of the Covenant to hell as you can."

Whitcomb smiled at Fol. "That was quite nice, Fol. As short as it'll be, I'll remember it for the rest of my life. Live long and prosperous, Fol Katarn. You've earned it."

with that, Whitcomb shut off his end, so he couldn't see them. They could still see him, however.

"Lieutenant, fire turrets five and three. Aim for those carriers. And raise a general broadcast channel to that entire fleet."

"Yes sir!" the LT said without hesitation. Sam could only look on in wonder, as Whitcomb goaded the Covenant on.

"Hey! You religious scumbags! Yeah, you! I've got something you all want!" Whitcomb held out the crystal-hologram. "All you have to do to get it is to defeat Humanity's mightiest warriors! Come and get us!"

Not to Sam's surprise, the Covenant Fleet turned in it's entirety towards the _Ascendant Justice_ in pursuit of their quarry, which was racing towards the massive Station. Whitcomb kept racing towards it, firing at the fleet as he went. "Come on! Is that the best you can do?"

Then a Super-carrier above the _AJ_ fired at the carrier with it's energy projector, and it severed the engine block of the carrier from the rest of the ship. It's momentum, however, still carried it towards the station. The view of the _AJ's_ bridge was briefly covered in static, but it soon cleared up again.

It showed the Admiral with a large cut on his forehead, and with his right sleeve rent open. Haverson's arm was at an odd angle, obviously broken. "Ah, that's better." Whitcomb said. "Come on. I have enough for all of you."

but then a swarm of Phantom dropships launched from the Supercarrier, and they boarded the _AJ_ with surprising speed. After only two minutes, he could see that they were burning through the bridge doors with torches. Whitcomb turned, and raised a shotgun he had scavenged from the armory of the _Gettysburg_

"Come and get me, you bastards! I'm right here!"

the door's glow briefly stopped, but then it exploded inwards. And beyond were dozens of Elites, all with activated Energy swords.

They stormed as one onto the bridge, and then, in an anticlimactic moment, the view turned to static. It didn't return.

Sam turned back to the view of the _Ascendant Justice_. It was nearly at the station, and Sam was sure that it's current momentum would let it collide with the station.

"Maneuver the drone behind the moon, otherwise it'll be destroyed in the blast." John said. "We can always redeploy it later."

Cortana complied, and the drone withdrew to the dark side of the moon. But not before Sam could see the Ascendant Justice collide with the massive station. It caused a large explosion, and Sam was sure a lot of debris was flying around. But since at that exact moment the drone withdrew, Sam couldn't see it.

He turned to the others who were watching. Sarah was sitting near the sensor station, looking at the large amount of red blips visible. Johnson and his marines had moved to the side of the bridge, though Sam didn't see why. Fol had moved to the data pedestal of Cortana, as she was showing the view of the cargo hold filled with Huragok.

Sam then turned his attention to the Spartans, nearly all of which had their helmets removed, with him and Six being the only ones still wearing them. Will had his combat knife out, sharpening it on his armor to calm his nerves. Sam had seen Six do so as well, so he suspected he'd gotten it from her. Fred and Linda were standing near the entrance of the bridge, keeping their distance, as it were. And, though she suspected no one actually saw it, Sam saw her give a concerned glance to Fred every few seconds. _So Fred was telling the truth, then._ Fred didn't seem to be showing anything concerning, though, so Sam didn't pay him anymore attention. John was looking ahead, likely paying his respects to Whitcomb. And Six was actually writing something down. Sam discreetly glanced over what it actually was.

It was the praise Fol had uttered to Whitcomb.

 _Did she truly value that kind of thing? He made a note of it to ask her later._

Sam turned back to the forward view of the ship, where the drone was still transmitting, despite the fact it was on the dark side of the moon.

There was a bright flash visible at the edge of the camera's view, and after a moment, it faded again. Cortana moved the drone back into view.

The station was gone. There was a lot of debris floating around, and there was a glow to it all from the still dissipating plasma. Of the 500 ships that had been here a day earlier, Sam saw only 12 recognizable hulls, and only three of those looked like they could still fly.

John turned to Cortana. "Make a few jumps, away from Covenant territory. Then jump to the outskirts of the Sol system. Contact Cairo station, inform them of our situation, and make the jump to Earth." Sam noticed his voice was subdued.

"Of course." Cortana said, and her avatar withdrew. Sam noted her voice also had a sad tone to it.

Sam turned to leave the bridge. And he saw Fred and Linda were already leaving. They were each headed in a different direction. He made his way to the armory.

On the way, however, Sam saw something odd.

Six was already off the bridge, and instead inside the Captain's quarters, gathering a few files. She removed something short and round from a pouch of her armor, and rolled it out. Sam saw it was another piece of paper, and Six was adding it to the files. She put them in a briefcase, closed it, and lay it down next to the desk of the Captain's quarters. He noticed Six lay her new Kukri, taken off of the pauldron, on the briefcase.

Sam knocked on the door, careful not to break it. Six looked up. She grabbed the briefcase and the knife, one in each hand.

"I'll be blunt and honest:" Six started, holding up a hand to stop Sam. "I belong to ONI. Always did, and likely always will. ONI isn't known to deploy Spartans from multiple divisions in close proximity. I don't know if I'll ever see any of you guys again. So consider these gifts." she held out the knife and the briefcase. "They contain all files I've recovered over the years where I'm mentioned. Including my own personal file _before_ the black ink." Six put the briefcase in Sam's hand. "As soon as you've read it all, burn it. I don't care if you show it to John or any of the others first, but burn it."

Sam didn't have a clue what to say. She was saying goodbye? Why?

"Still thinking we won't survive? Are you still that desperate? Despite the fact the Flood is gone?"

"I don't know. Either of us could die in this war, and want at least _one_ person to know the truth."

Sam nodded. "I understand. But if we both survive, and I give you that knife back, you _will_ buy me that drink."

Six laughed. "As long as you buy the food, remember?"

Sam chuckled as well. "of course. I was only waiting for you to ask."

Six nodded, and she moved out of the quarters. "Take care of the others, Sam. Especially John. You and Kelly are his moral supports throughout the war. And with her gone, you're the only one left."

Sam nodded. "Don't get yourself killed. Or burned."

"Hah. And all that free space on the rest of my face? A burn scar here and there would complete the picture nicely." Six made the gesture of a Spartan smile, and turned around and walked away.

Sam returned it, and moved back towards the armory.

Jameson Locke completed his report, and drank the coffee still left in his mug.

ONI had just gained intel from intercepted transmissions that a Sangheili Fleetmaster by the name of Thel Vadam'ee has been the one to lead the Covenant war effort for years, and had been the mastermind behind the majority of humanity's defeats and losses. And that he was the one that discovered Reach, and had subsequently sent ahead a small force to keep the UNSC busy while he gathered the necessary ships.

That is, if an invading army, 6 corvettes and a Supercarrier could be called a 'small force'. And, with Reach's defenses weakened by the small force, the planet had swiftly fallen. All because of Thel's genius.

A part of Locke respected Thel for it. The Covenant were known to be imitative rather than innovative, and it was nice to see a little bit of change to that image.

But the other part of Locke loathed Thel for him massacring millions upon millions of humans. He had slaughtered children and women. He had destroyed worlds beyond even Locke's count.

Which was why he recommended to ONI that he had to be eliminated, alongside their infamous gladiator Fol katarn'ee. What Thel had done from ships in orbit, Fol did directly on the ground. Locke didn't know what to think of him. He was highly skilled, and, if ONI Section II's reports were to be believed, He had even killed a Spartan. But he seemed to possess a sense of honor or self-righteousness. He always made quick and clean kills, he didn't slaughter at random, and he had even saved a Human when he was hanging from a cliff, and let him live. He was... odd.

But he was one of their best Field-Marshals, and so he, naturally, got a elimination-recommendation as well.

His Chatter whirred, and he checked it.

Odd. ONI wanted him to appear at Cairo station's docking bay ASAP.

It wasn't that he had never had such a message from ONI before. But this was an unusual location, even for ONI. For Cairo station belonged to the Navy, not ONI. They could only come there undercover or as guests.

Locke made his way there, taking the Orbital Elevator instead of commandeering a pelican. There weren't that many of them free right now, as most of the Orbital Defense Platforms in Earth's orbit were being upgraded, and every single ship was occupied ferrying troops to and from the roughly three hundred platforms.

Lock arrived at the dock after roughly three hours. There, the only other ONI officer he knew was allowed on the station was waiting for him.

Captain Serin Osman, an excellent commanding officer, and, if the rumors were to be believed, Admiral Parangosky's successor if she ever fell into a coffin.

"Ma'am." Locke said. "you wanted me here?"

"Yes." Osman answered. "We've received word from HIGHCOM that a survivor has returned from Reach. The Gettysburg."

Locke raised his eyebrows. He had the compulsion to show more, but ONI training had beaten that out of him.

Locke had read the reports, and the Gettysburg was assigned to the defense of Reach. It was shocking that there had been survivors _at_ _all_.

"The Gettysburg? I thought she had been destroyed over Reach."

"Your sources weren't entirely correct. She was disabled, not destroyed. And a band of survivors got her up and running again. And you'll never guess who."

Locke looked at her. "From your tone, I'd have to guess at least one Spartan. Am I correct?"

Osman showed one of her rare smiles. It wasn't a genuine one, though. "Make that _seven_ Spartans. And a few marines and civilians. And thousands of Huragok. And you'll know the final 'guest'."

Locke tilted his head slightly. "Who?"

"Field-Marshal Fol Katarn'ee, though he has lost the 'ee at the end."

"Oh, really? And why is he still alive? I thought I, along with a hundred others, recommended his termination."

"Because he claims he wants to defect, and the seven Spartans all vouch for him. And since I heard this from Hood, they have already approved of taking him in. It also means we can't take him to a Midnight facility. We're merely present for the initial questioning."

Locke nodded. "And you want me here since I have studied him extensively, and know him the best of all of ONI."

"Of the entire UNSC." Osman corrected. "They're arriving in half an hour, so be prepared."

Locke nodded, and Osman left.

After half an hour, The Gettysburg, Locke could see, finally came out of Slipspace.

To Locke's trained eye, the ship seemed... different. For one thing, at the place where the MAC-cannon used to be, there was now a small, purple cannon between the ship's prongs. The ship itself also had additional armor plating, and her engines seemed more... _streamlined_ , than a standard Paris-class frigate.

Locke signaled to the station's security personnel, and they all lined up at the hatch. Locke prepared as well, holding a datafile for the Elite's official defection in one hand, while hiding a magnum behind his back in the other. He didn't trust the defection one bit.

The Frigate lined up, and it successfully docked with the station. The security teams stood at attention, and the door cycled open.

Beyond the hatch, once it opened, Locke saw who were beyond. The seven remaining Spartans stood at the sides, with behind them the ODST, the marines, and the two civilians. Behind them, as far as the eye could see, the ship's corridors were swarming with Huragok, all fidgeting with one another, like new employees picking lint from each other on the first day on the job. Only one of them stood out, floating a bit closer to the docking tube.

In front of all of them, however, stood someone Locke had never expected to see in this star-system on peaceful terms.

Covenant Field-Marshal Fol Katarn. His armor was heavily burned around the chest armor, and it had a black color to it instead of purple, but Locked committed his face to memory. It was _definitely_ him.

And he held his hands up in the air.

"I am Fol Katarn." it said. "Former Field-Marshal of the Covenant. And I surrender."

Location: High Council reception hall, Capital city of Kortan-Sho, independent Covenant colony of Sang'Katarn

Date: (Error: date unknown. Possible cause: erasure from archives.)

She waited silently as she waited for her turn to appear before the Sang'Katarn's ruling council, colloquially referred to as 'the Clan' by those from Sang'Katarn. The council itself was quite large, consisting of about roughly three hundred members from all species of the Covenant. Even the San'Shyuum, despite the general hatred of the species on the planet.

For the San'Shyuum had let the assaults on Sang'Katarn millennia ago, and it was only due to the incompetence of the San'Shyuum, and the superior skill and tactics of the Sang'Katarn warriors that they'd survived at all. Since then, after the fifth invasion attempt, there has been a reluctant cease-fire. Roughly five or six human centuries ago, about three or four generations before her own time, Sang'Katarn had sent warriors to the Covenant training academies on Sanghelios in order to determine the Covenant's strength. Most would claim it was to make the peace last longer, make it more permanent. But in reality, Sang'Katarn was planning to split from the Covenant, for the Clan had realized long ago that the difference in policies and ideologies was simply too great for them to live alongside each other peacefully.

But in order to split away, they had to determine the Covenant's strength, learn from it, and determine if they could get away with it. And they were learning, alright.

Every development the Covenant had in artificial intelligences had come from Sang'Katarn. And, as such, each had a secret subroutine installed that transmitted all of it's data from Sang'Katarn every three weeks, or the second before it's termination. And that meant _all_ data, like new ship schematics, important orders from the Hierarchs on High-Charity, and even here and there coordinates from a previously hidden human colony world.

The Clan had learned back then that they had been far from ready to split up. The Covenant fleet had outnumbered their own three-hundred-to-one, and the Covenant had had a superior edge in technology, and had only held back in fear of the ruthlessness of the warriors of Sang'Katarn. So, in order to catch up in the one-sided arms race, the Clan had ordered the introduction of AI, so that they could infiltrate the Covenant systems, and send back the data needed to get on more even odds.

And She had been shocked when she'd learned the truth to it all. As the Human's intelligence division, ONI, had claimed in their propaganda, the Covenant itself was imitative, not innovative. Much of their technology had been reverse-engineered from Forerunner artifacts. And while that gave them a definite edge over the other races of the Covenant as they were conquered, like the Unggoy, or absorbed, like the Huragok, it slowly led to an inbred complacency when it led to new scientific discoveries. The San'Shyuum had no desire for any members of the Covenant to grow more powerful than the Forerunners, and all members of the collective followed suit. Only the Huragok seemed dissatisfied with it, but they were, in response, given more tasks to keep them occupied.

The Clan had made no such mistake, and had ordered everyone with a sufficient intelligence loyal to them, from the lowliest Unggoy to the mightiest Sangheili, to relearn the arts of science, like Physics, Math, Chemistry, Biology and countless more of such fields. And they had managed to break the line of complacency that the rest of the Covenant suffered from. They had managed to improve their weaponry greatly. To name only one example, where the Covenant had only an Energy Sword with merely one power setting, the warriors of Sang'Katarn had multiple levels of power for their energy swords, to the point where the one of the leading Kaidon himself had a sword that could kill a hunter if three Personal energy shields protected it, and the battery wouldn't lose any of it's charge. The only back-draw to said improvement was that it's blade color was different because of it, and therefor it was easy to distinguish between a normal blade, and a _Katarn_ , as they came to be called. Named in remembrance of Juhar Katarn, her grandmother, who had created the blade, and who had become Sang'Katarn's battlemaster, which was an equivalent to a Human Marine general. And who had died when she had offered to help put down a Jiralhanae rebellion on Doisac. And where she had been brutally killed by the leading Jiralhanae Chieftain. Of course, she had taken down thirteen of his predecessors across the two weeks before it, before finally succumbing to her injuries. And the killer, impressed by her skill, had a change of heart, and joined the efforts to put down the rebellion. For his skill and newfound 'moral consciousness', he had been taken in by Sang'Katarn afterwards, immune from retribution of the Hierarchs.

In short, Sang'Katarn's power had grown, and while the Covenant fleets still outnumbered them, it had been evened up to ten-to-one, and due to the superior technology of the Clan, it was evened up the odds in their favor.

And, after seeing the Humans in combat with, what had assumed to be antiquated, their mainly slugthrower and coilgun weaponry. But, after having seen how effective they were during Cole's campaign to retake Harvest, individual minds attempted to replicate the Human's MAC-cannons for Sang'Katarn fleets. But success had evaded them for a long time, and had only come when Fol Katarn'ee had captured a Marathon-class heavy Cruiser for Sang'Katarn. It had no data on human tech, unfortunately, as the databases had been purged. But Kronos, the lead Jiralhanae representative of Sang'Katarn, and a Jiralhanae War-Chieftain at that, making him second in rank only to Tartarus himself, had managed to make her 'disappear' from Covenant radars, and send her over to Sang'Katarn for study, repair and refit. And from the name painted on the hull, She had learned it had been called the UNSC Great Lance.

Steps sounded behind her, and she smiled, despite her growing puzzlement. A Sangheili clad in Purple Field-Marshal armor, which had black armor segments mixed in it.

He was Kal Katarn, the current Battlemaster of the Sang'Katarn armies, which numbered in the millions. Frankly, everyone volunteered to be in the Sang'Katarn armies, even those off-world, so the amount of beings in the army _outnumbered_ the actual population.

What set him truly apart from every other being, however, was his height. Due to a genetic mutation that occurred during his hatching (Sangheili are egg-born), the man was over a Sangheili's head taller than even Arbiter Ripa 'Moramee, who had already been known to be tall for their kind.

Kal was also her brother. He smiled as he spotted her. They approached the remaining distance between each other, and hugged. After a few seconds, Kal separated it. "Long time no see. Sister. How's the defense of the planet? Everyone still bowing down to your rigid doctrine?"

He was referring to the fact that she had a high regard for rules while people were off-duty. And that number had steadily been growing, as over the last few months, more ships had been called back, and more and more of said ships had been forced to stay in the Sang'Katarn star-system. While on-duty, however, she, as a Fleetmaster held in high regard, was a genius in battle, and while she wasn't as known as Thel Vadam or the now-deceased Rho 'Barutamee, she could easily best them in ship-to-ship combat in three to one odds in their favor... at the same time. In personal defense, she knew her brothers Kal and Fol were more skilled, and she was about as skilled as the average Covenant Zealot. But she was a tactical genius and strategic mastermind on a ship. And was often the one to make the plans to put forth the ideas her brothers made up in their spare time.

It had often gotten the three in a lot of trouble.

She shortly laughed. "Just like how you and Fol are still trying to decide who's better."

"Just because he has a rightly earned legendary reputation, doesn't mean he automatically is better than me."

"Oh, I'm sure he'll be along to contradict you soon enough. How has it been these past few weeks been?"

Kal suddenly went very quiet, and she knew something was wrong. He looked briefly at the door that led to the Council Chambers, before looking her in the eyes again. "You will be called before the Council as well, right?"

Now she was starting to grow even more puzzled. What was it that he wasn't allowed to tell her right now, but that he could tell her in front of the Council? Sure, she was supposed to keep quiet about the three Forerunner Crystal fragments she had recovered from the human-named Eridanus system's asteroid belt, but that was because the Clan was still uncertain of what it could do, and she was to give them her final report on the situation.

"Yes. Why?"

"Then you will hear it from them. Oath of Silence, as you can understand."

She nodded. An Oath of Silence was, to put it simple, the oath to be silent about a subject until the Council relieved them of their oath. And one could only talk about it with the Council, or the people that were sworn in with him/her.

Taking such an Oath of Silence rarely happened in the company of others. She understood his hesitance to speak about it.

She was about to ask more, when a Jiralhanae and a Sangheili opened the door. "The Council is able to receive you now, Katarn. The both of you."

Kal nodded alongside her, and the two of them entered. She spent a single moment checking if her own armor and command cloak were at least clean before entering the room proper.

The chamber was quite large, as it had to be in order to contain a hundred members of various species. It was shaped like a vague arena, except it had only one entrance for the speaker, and the seats for the council members surrounding the central speaking area. Every council member could easily access the central speaking spot through one of the many staircases that were mixed between the seats. The only seat that stood out from everything else was the Throne, which was on an upper balcony overseeing the entire meeting from up above.

The only back-draw to the design of this room was that, aside from the Kaidon's entrance, there was only one other: the Speaker's entrance. So everyone, no matter if they wanted to speak or not, had to enter through the large, easily viewable entrance. It was built with that prospect in mind, in order to intimidate the weak-minded ambassadors of the Covenant. But that didn't stop the counselors themselves from feeling watched while entering.

She moved inside, and took a brief look around. Her old mentor, former Unngoy Deacon Ghanak was present. He had spotted her from an early age, and had mentored her in the political area of command, and how to evade the Mainstream Covenant's criticism by staying in the shadows, so others would underestimate her due to her anonymity. He was also a close friend of her.

She also recognized the wise shipmaster Ooskoo Rotam. He had, unlike most, directly joined the Covenant directly after completing his training on Sang'Katarn, going to Sanghelios with his three brothers, Praetor, Ackillian and Rahgath, to see the ancient Pre-Covenant sites near Sunaion.

And yet, despite being so far away, he and two of the three brothers had never strayed from the atheist belief of Sang'Katarn. And the third, while starting to believe the Forerunners were actual gods, Rahgath was still loyal to Sang'Katarn and his brothers, and would die for them.

She saw Kal had moved over to join Ooskoo near their respective bench, the one of Artifact retrieval. _Interesting. He had been shipped with Rahgath. Has something happened while he was away?_

She herself moved over to sit next to Ghanak. It was polite, after all, when you were invited to attend a council meeting by one of it's members that you would then join said member's side. She noticed a lot of people were restless, including the three few San'Shyuum that had seats on the council.

She was still trying to make sense why these three were allowed in here in the first place, for the majority of the council hated the species. Granted, they had given wise council for over two human decades, but still no one on Sang'Katarn truly trusted them.

The fact that one of them, the Prophet of Peace, was in fact the second cousin of the current Prophet of Truth, who had supposedly exiled him and his two cohorts when they had objected to Truth's declaration of war on the humans, it was astounding they were still alive.

She sat down next to the former Deacon. He looked, contrary to the rest of the council, oddly serene.

"Sssso," he said with a raspy, modulated voice from his gas tank. Since his species required Methane to breathe, they were allowed to have the tanks in here for breathing support. His individual mask, however, had a tendency to make the S sound longer than it really was. "You decided to attend, after all."

"You were the one who taught me it pays to listen to the Council _at least once a month_." she said with a grin.

"Yeah, but you, and your ssssiblingsssss for that matter, aren't known to heed advice from old people like me."

she let out a short laugh. "Well, guess what: times have changed, and I value your council over my own father's."

Ghanak looked at her. "Be very careful about saying that here. The wrong people could here it."

she nodded. "Of course." she paused for a bit. "Why am I here, Ghanak? What use am I to the council here? They could have gotten that report on paper, or by a data transfer. Why must I report about... _it_ in person?"

Ghanak sighed, which sounded like a hiss. "A lot of... dissssturbing things have happened in a very sssshort time, my child, and the Council is afraid the wrong people hear the wrong sssstuff." he paused. "The fragments you found are among the dissssturbing things."

She nodded. "Enough said."

Then the doors at the top opened, indicating the Kaidon was arriving. Everyone silenced those who hadn't noticed, and soon everyone stood in respect.

If Fol Katarn's record was legendary, then the Kaidon's could soon be considered to be a myth instead of the truth. He had twice as much experience in fighting as Fol or his siblings, and he could beat anyone in battle.

But where Fol had been unscathed for the entirety of the war due to the new Technology of Sang'Katarn, his father, the Kaidon Reghok Katarn, had not. While he had managed to avoid injury during the beginning of the war, he had made a mistake on the attack on the human colony of Jericho VII.

He had been arrogant.

He had captured a human child, believing he had defeated and dispirited her by killing her parents in front of her own eyes. He had then taken her, intending to use her to unlock the Covenant relic found on the planet, which had a great similarity to one of the ruins found in Tah.

But the Girl, which had, if she remembered correctly, had two differently colored eyes (A blue and orange one), had stolen one of the Unggoy's guns, shot them both, and escaped the facility. Reghok, his pride wounded at having let his charge escape, had followed her trail, and followed her to the main UNSC outpost left on the planet. He had discovered the Spartans were also going to evacuate the planet through that place. Reghok had attacked the camp, confident he could defeat everyone there, as he'd been testing the new shield technology, which every Field-Marshal in the Covenant now wore.

But he hadn't accounted for one thing: the girl.

She had grabbed the Plasma Pistol she'd stolen, overcharged it, and fired it at the Elite, which had downed Reghol's shields. The Elite had turned around to kill her, but one of the Spartans had taken a rocket launcher at the Elite. It had hit in the back, and Reghok had barely survived the encounter.

He had been believed dead by the humans, and been left behind on the planet. He had been recovered, and been brought back to Health. But at a price.

His original spine had been shattered by the blast, along with the bones in his legs and the backside of his skull. All of said bones had been replaced by steel replacements, and his legs had braces to help support the legs. But he could never be in a prolonged combat confrontation again, aside from the occasional sparring match with a relative or worthy opponent.

But none of that seemed to bother him now, as he entered the room and took his seat in the throne. He made a gesture, and everyone sat down.

"Welcome, fellow counselors and observers." he started. "It is a pleasure to see you all, having come from so far and taking so long to reach us. But I would not call you all here without good reason." he gestured to multiple of the individuals across the chamber, her included. She noticed Kronos, the primary Jiralhanae representative on the council, was also among those as well.

Kronos was, like Kal, tall for his kind, to the point he could look down on a Mgalekgolo. He was the only Jiralhanae who had actually been born without the inborn tendency to berserk, and used that fact wisely. Like her, he was an excellent tactician in space, and while he was no use overseeing large-scale operations on the ground, he could command a group of beings up to fifteen. He was also the only Jiralhanae physically strong enough to wield _two_ Gravity Hammers. As he had slung across his back right now.

"I will let us start with the usual of these meetings: the important subjects that have had no intelligence as of late. Kronos, still no news about the 'Legionary armada'?"

Kronos shook his head. "No, Kaidon. Nothing aside from the usual rumors and whispers on the Sangheili colonies, who all fear which one of them are next in line. Gharst and his command chain now have bounties on their heads, but no one has been able to locate them so far."

Reghok nodded. "A pity, despite your relentless efforts."

Kronos inclined his head. Reghok inclined his own in acknowledgement. "Prophet of Knowledge, nothing new about the Spartan Grey team?"

"No." the young San'Shyuum immediately said. "They still reside in either the ruins of Tah, or their crashed Stealth-vessel. They made another attempt at gathering intel on the ground-side shipdocks, but security is currently too numerous for them to make another attempt."

"Do not dismiss the Demons so easily, Prophet." Ooskoo said. "They have taken large amounts o Covenant before, like at the Rubble station. They would most certainly try again, if our protocols let up."

"Of course, noble shipmaster." the Prophet said, as he shrank back again. "I didn't mean anything by it."

Ooskoo nodded. "I know you didn't. But I have recently encountered a few Demons myself, and they have, the seven of them, taken on armies, and yet none of them are corpses as I speak. They-"

"Master Rotam," Reghok interrupted. "while I appreciate your praise of the Demons, please leave the details of the... _events_ for later. Your time will be later, old friend."

Ooskoo nodded, and he sat down again. She looked at her brother, who was stationed aboard Ooskoo's vessel. He shook his head. _Later_.

She was intrigued. But she decided to wait her father out.

"and now, on to more important matters. Kronos, I would like you to have the honors again, as you brought this to my attention." Reghok said.

"Very well." he grumbled, and he retrieved something from his own equipment belt. It was a holographic projector.

"Twelve planetary rotations ago, the Covenant discovered Reach, one of the Human's strongest human fortress worlds in their so-called 'Inner Colonies'. While you are all aware of this, I will bring to your attention what was found on the planet." Kronos said, and then activated the Hologram.

It showed a massive chamber, with about twelve balconies, and a pedestal in the center of the room. There was a collapsed mount of rubble on one end of the wall, at the bottom.

The balconies were already filled up with thousands of covenant.

"This was found inside one of their mountains, underneath a research and ex-mining base. And what the Covenant saw there... I'll show you the rest."

he then hit another button, and the photo started to move. She realized it was in fact a video.

And she saw it all. How a Spirit had landed, and how it's crew, which had composed of Spartans, took care of the forces on the ground.

And how a Sangheili Field-Marshal jumped out. One bearing a sickening resemblance to Fol.

Then the others dug near the pile of rubble. And, to her surprise, another Spartan jumped through. A whole bunch of them followed, along with a scientist.

Kronos paused the video, and zoomed in on the scientist. She was hol-

 _Her Crystal, whole!_

"This is a Forerunner Crystal, and the Humans seemed to have accessed it before the Covenant could. Hail to them for it, but it is important of note they later destroyed it."

"A pity" one of the San'Shyuum, the one of Wisdom, if she remembered correctly, said. "Are the Fragments recovered, at least?"

Kronos nodded, and then turned.

To look at _her_.

"My colleague can elaborate on that."

Nera took this as her signal, and stood up. "My battlegroup scoured their last known position, an asteroid belt where they effected repairs on stolen ships. We managed to recover a few fragments, but the Crystal couldn't be completed with what we had. We suspect the fragments are either lost in Slipspace, or, more likely, still in human hands."

The Prophet nodded, and sat down again, satisfied with the answer. After no one asked more questions, she did so as well. Kronos nodded, and he continued. "The Crystal, however, is not what I find the most... interesting." he hit play again.

The video continued on, showing how the humans gathered, and how a pair of Mgalekgolo lost their patience, and fired at the humans. And how the Field-Marshal had jumped in the way and had taken the shots, and how it fell.

Kronos paused the video, and played it back a bit. He selected the Elite, and let the video play a bit more slowly as it got in the way.

She was sure now, it was her last brother, Fol Katarn, legendary Field-Marshal of Sang'Katarn. Saving humans for destruction. She initially found it unthinkable. No one would rescue a _human_.

And yet, for the entirety of the war, Fol had said humans deserved respect for outlasting the Covenant for so long, not hated for offending what he claimed were false gods. And he had hated the San'Shyuum with a passion. Could he have been persuaded to join their cause?

Only now, the other counselors recognized him, and most either were silent in shock or screaming in rage. Soon, the entire chamber was in an uproar, demanding an explanation for what most saw as treason. Others were defending him, claiming he was trying to save the crystal. Ghanak, like her, didn't join in on it. She noted Ooskoo and Kal were oddly serene about it.

"SILENCE!" Kronos yelled at the tops of his lung. Everyone sat down in silence. Kronos looked around the hall once, before continuing. "Yes, this is Fol Katarn, our once famed Field-Marshal. Yes, he seemingly commits treason. But this isn't the entirety of it. Watch. And learn."

he hit play again, and the video started normally again. Fol got up from the shots, his armor blackened, and he was himself visibly wounded. But he was alive, at least.

He looked around the chamber, and started making a speech. And what he said _shocked_ her.

"Members of the Covenant!" He began, yelling in order to be heard. "You are all fools, idiots, and worse, ignorant of the truth! You claim to be the rightful Successors to the Forerunners, and that it is _your_ destiny to begin the Great Journey! Yet you ignore the fact that Humans can activate Forerunner artifacts, and we can't! You ignore the fact that Humans discovered a Halo before us, while we have studied the Forerunners for millennia! You ignore the fact that Humans could even take the Crystal, and keep it out of your hands this long! You claim to be the _inheritors_? I SPIT on you all, who claim to have the right to exterminate a species purely because only _one_ being deemed it so! I am Fol Katarn, and if this is what the Covenant has descended to, then I would rather die alongside a thousand Demons before I would call one of you an ally again!" Fol paused as he spat out some blood, and he raised his Fuel-Rod gun. "Now, Who's first?!"

Fol started to fire on the Covenant on the balconies, and the Demons soon did so as well, as well as the captured Wraith tank. Kronos finally shut the video off, as nothing new could be gained from it.

"As you can see" Kronos said. "one of our own has defected, disillusioned with the San'Shyuum, and he has taken refuge along the Humans. Any comments."

The Prophet of Peace had gotten to his feet. "I would like to have it noted that he mentioned a Halo, and that he was assigned to the Fleet of Particular justice, which has been out of contact for over twenty planetary rotations. Could it be they found one of the 'Sacred Rings'?"

at this, multiple members of the council started to mumble among themselves. She stood up. "That fleet had been assigned to the assault of Reach, commanded by Thel Vadam'ee. They followed a single ship, leaving the rest of the fleet behind. If they did find it, it had to be after abandoning their post."

"are you suggesting Thel would abandon his duty? That _bootlicker_?" Kronos asked, as he got up as well.

"You know as well as I that he will do anything a Prophet asks of him, even a lower one like the Prophet of Stewardship, who was with Particular Justice."

"That is outrageous. Thel outranks him. He has superior claim command."

"You think he'd _care_?"

Kronos was sourly tempted to walk over to her and punch her in her jaws, she knew. For despite his earlier criticism, he highly respected Thel's skill. Reghok intervened, however. "That's enough, both of you."

Both nodded, and sat down. Kronos sent her a brief glare.

"While Thel Vadam's fate is interesting, there are more... pressing matters at hand."

She turned towards her father in renewed interest. Kronos did so as well.

"Ooskoo, I'd like you, along with Kal Katarn, to summarize the... events that happened over the last six months."

Ooskoo nodded. "I was under attack by an UNSC frigate, the UNSC Midsummernight, when we received a call from our brother Rahgath. We jumped away, and we saw what Rahgath had discovered."

He grabbed his own projector, and activated it. It showed a ring.

A ring 10.000 kilometers in diameter, as shown by the view of two Corvettes and a Frigate in lower orbit of the inside.

"He discovered a Halo, or Installation 06, as it came to be called. We ca-"

but Ooskoo was drowned out by the multitude of new voices that came to cry out their own opinion. Some voicing that the Ring should be destroyed, others that it should be studied, and some were even beginning to argue among themselves. Kal stood up.

"ENOUGH! ALL OF YOU, SHUT UP!" He thundered across the room. She couldn't help but be impressed at her brother.

At hearing his call for silence, the majority sat down again, with only who exceptions. And they, after receiving a stern look from Reghok, they shut up as well. Kal looked around the chamber, once, before nodding in Ooskoo's direction. "This is indeed a Halo. But that doesn't warrant interrupting him. That doesn't warrant not even giving him the chance to tell what has happened on that ring, and above it. Be silent, and let our brother speak!" the ones who argued looked down in shame.

Ooskoo stood again, and continued. "As I was saying, we came to Rahgath's call for aid, and we hammered that ship. It took damage, but hid behind the ring, and its stealth systems activated, preventing us from locating it. What happened next, however, shocked us all."

Ooskoo played the video, and it showed the battle as Ooskoo had portrayed it, with the Corvettes having the frigate in a crossfire, and it fleeing to the other side of the ring, before falling of their radar.

And Rahgath's corvette, after receiving a Spirit dropship from Ooskoo, opening fire on Ooskoo's ship, destroying it.

"I had a short conversation with our brother, conversing about whether he was worthy of activating the ring. After that, I sent an envoy who would get supplies and part for repair, when he opened fire on us."

she stood up, as he finished his sentence. "Yes, Fleetmaster?"

"If I may ask, what happened to Rahgath? Surely this crime didn't go unpunished?"

Ooskoo nodded. "It won't. He is currently aboard the brig of his own ship, after I and the survivors, receiving aid from the survivors of the Midsummernight, took it back, and secured the rest of the ring from his own forces."

she nodded, and sat down. She would have many questions later on, but at the moment she was satisfied with the answer she'd gotten.

Ooskoo nodded in respect, and continued his story. "Across a span of Six months, Rahgath and his forces prepared for the activation of the ring, while ensuring the humans stayed put. He didn't kill them, as I initially suspected, but he ensured it would be better to stay put, rather than going on the offensive. Kal, while forced to work for Rahgath, found _someone_ who had something useful to say."

At this, he whistled a tune, and gestured at the roof. And something flew through the open window.

And she was shocked. A Spherical object flew through the window. It had a central, bright blue eye, and was silver in color.

It was a monitor, a Forerunner construct meant to oversee Forerunner installations. It floated over to float beside Ooskoo.

"Greetings. I am 16807 Contrite Vestige, _former_ monitor of Installation 06. I understood you all would have a few questions for me." it spoke with a light, mechanical voice. It's voice was slightly what the humans would call British. But at first no one on the Council spoke, shocked at what floated before them. And why wouldn't they be? No one had recovered an intact monitor before, and the only one the Covenant had was on the Forerunner Keyship on High-Charity. And, despite their Atheism, one on the Council couldn't help but feel this Monitor belonged to a god.

The Prophet of peace was the first one to rise, and spoke for all of them. "While I'm certain once everyone has recovered from their stupor, they will have plenty of questions. For now, monitor, I have only three."

It bobbed slightly in acknowledgement. "Of course, San'Shyuum. All you have to do is ask."

Peace got up, and started to go down to the central speaking area down below. "One: What is the purpose of the Halo rings?"

It looked at it. "Odd. The Augmented human asked the same question. But fair enough, I'll answer the question. The Seven Halo rings were designed as offensive last-resort-weapons against potential Flood-hosts. It would render the Parasite harmless if it had worked."

Peace nodded. "As I suspected. And my second question: What has happened to the Forerunners?"

"After all other possible options were exhausted by my creators, they activated the rings. They, along with every living sentient being in the effective radius, died. As planned, for otherwise they would all have been infected by the Flood."

Peace looked around. The others were all still stunned. And she could see him actually sink his head, as if he was right about something terrible for a very long time, and just proven right.

"Thank you, Monitor. I'm sorry for the silence of everyone else, but what you are saying is... contradictory to what we have been told for millennia. It is shocking to hear."

the Monitor nodded. "I understand. The ones that asked this question, the ones still aboard that 'Corvette' in orbit, had the same reaction. But what's your third question?"

Peace let out a big sigh, briefly looked down, before looking it in the eye again. "What were Humans to the Forerunners?" at this, Ooskoo and Kal stood a bit straighter as well. Apparently they hadn't asked this question yet.

The monitor tilted itself slightly. "Finally. A question I haven't heard before. They were the Reclaimers. The original successors of the Precursors. The Forerunners, jealous of that privilege they had, wiped out the Precursors, and claimed the Mantle of Responsibility. Humanity was enslaved by the forerunners, and would have been wiped out as well, were it not for the efforts of a select few, like the Librarian. They were indexed on the Lesser Ark, for survival of the firing of the array, along with hundreds of other species. The Librarian, knowing Humanity would survive, also implanted genesongs in Humanity, to ensure their evolutions. Their Augmented 'Spartans', their Mjolnir Combat skin. Even their Ancilla's, numerous as they are. All the culmination of the Librarian's planning for their ascendance up the mantle."

Peace nodded at the Monitor. "Thank you, Monitor. I need to contemplate this. As does the rest of the Council."

it nodded. "Alright. I'll be up above, if any of you have more questions." and with that, it floated upwards, hovering near the roof, inspecting the artwork and design. Peace looked at Reghok. "I have been telling all of you this for years. For Decades. And to be silent of what Fol Katarn preaches, especially with his recent defection. This only proves it. Humanity is not our enemy. Make arrangements to send an envoy to Humanity. Put _down_ the hostilities, and make _peace_ with them. Help them in this war. Let them _survive_."

Reghok was silent. As was the rest of the Council. But everyone was now looking up.

Towards either the monitor or Reghok.

After about two minutes, he finally stood. "Gather every ship and soldier, whether fresh as grass or as beaten and experienced as Thel Katarn, that is completely loyal to Sang'Katarn, and have them gather in this system. _No one leaves._ We gather, while we decide."

at this, everyone looked surprised at him, save for the Monitor, who was lost in his thoughts as he looked around the chamber.

"This isn't an instant decision. We need to think about this, and work out all finer points. But understand this: One way or another, the Covenant won't have our loyalty any longer. Mark my words."

everyone nodded in agreement. This news contradicted _everything_ the Covenant preached. If Vadam had found another Halo, and Fol somehow heard the same news, no wonder he has sided with Humanity. She found she understood his decision a lot better.

Before the Council could leave, though, Reghok spoke again. "One more matter I would like to say, before we all leave."

Everyone looked at him again, including her.

"Everyone knows that three weeks ago, our Commander of the Fleet, Ka'gran Osan, was killed in combat. Everyone has spoken. And the choice of who will become his successor is down to two people: Kronos, our noble Jiralhanae member and Osan's close friend, or my own daughter, Nera Katarn, and Osan' protege."

Nera suddenly found every eye in the room looking at her, even the monitor.

Reghok stood up. "I say that we choose Osan's successor now, so the arriving forces can have a leader to rally behind. All against, stand up now." none did.

"Good." Reghok said. "If you wish that Nera Katarn becomes our new Commander of the Fleet, raise your hand now."

To her surprise, over two-third of the room raised their hands. Including, she noted, Kronos.

"If you wish that Kronos becomes our new Commander of the Fleet, raise your hand now." the ones that hadn't raised their hands before now did. Nera would do so as well, but she wasn't an official member, being merely invited to watch. So she didn't. But if she could, she would do so. She didn't want all that responsibility. Not that she wasn't skilled, or didn't want the position, but she wasn't ready. She needed more experience, more encounters and fights. She had had little of all.

"Then it's decided." Reghok said. "Seventy one in favor of Nera Katarn, and Twenty nine in favor of Kronos. Outvoted by 42 councilors, Kronos won't be Commander of the Fleet. Nera Katarn, please rise."

Nera, overwhelmed by the events, rose.

"By the choice of the Council, and favored by most, you are now chosen as Commander of the Fleet. You will command the entirety of the Sang'Katarn fleets, and have command over all Fleetmasters. Will you accept this responsibility?"

Nera stood frozen. Her, the Commander? It was a dream. It had to be.

But it was also her dream. And she wasn't about to say no, despite her inexperience. She could ask Ooskoo or Kronos for advice, after all. "I will."

Reghok nodded, and he, along everyone else, stood, and raised their now-activated swords, hammers or other weapons in her direction. "Then by the power vested in me by the people, you are now Commander Nera Katarn. You are called upon to serve, as others will be called upon to serve by you. You will be the best you can be. You will be the protector of Sang'Katarn and all planets loyal to her. You are our shield and sword. Though a great deal of hardship is on the road ahead, we are confident you will be victorious. Let our lives be prosperous under your guarding light. Hail!"

"Hail!" everyone present yelled. And Nera glowed.

She had started this day by gathering a few Crystal fragments. And she finished by being effectively the leader of the Sang'Katarn military, second only to the Kaidon himself. She still didn't believe it.

Two beings approached, a Yanme'e and and a Huragok. They held a cloak, black on the outside, orange on the inside, and it was lined with gold. They hung it across her shoulders, and attached the clips to her armor.

Everyone bowed towards her, and she could even see Kronos smiling. Nera looked on, as everyone rose.

Today would be a wonderful day. But with the discovery of not one, but possibly _two_ Halo rings, and the revelations made by this monitor, the following days would be tough.

 _A great deal of hardship, indeed._

* * *

 ** _There are those who would consider this the end of a tale. others would consider it merely the first step of a new one. me, I consider it a journey, of long, trying steps. but, in the end, with our brothers at our sides, we'll be victorious._**

 **Gharst Omenlumin.**


	6. Epilogue 1: Our sins will haunt us

**Here, the first part of the next chapter. Enjoy.**

* * *

Epilogue 1: Our sins will haunt us

Location: Warehouse district, Angel city, Hidden Insurrectionist colony world, designated "Troy", Aligned with Rebel Insurrectionist Front (RIF).

Date: 02-08-2525

* * *

Graves was a foolhardy man, James MacAllen thought. They had no business being here, and it could get them killed.

They had joined the RIF after about two weeks of traveling. They had made it to the colony world relatively unscathed, despite the fact both Mac and Barker had no idea what they would do once they were cleared of all suspicions. Mac's plan to take over this insurrectionist movement had sounded ideal back on Reach, but now that he actually knew how their leadership was built, he wasn't as sure they could pull it off.

Their leadership was basically a council of twelve, consisting of various prominent Insurrectionists whose allegiance was unknown to the UNSC at large, like Lyrenne Castilla. They formed a council, where they all schemed and plotted various ways to take care of the UNSC, with Lyrenne being an advocate for open assault.

But for all their scheming, nothing productive ever truly happened wherever the council was involved. They were more busy taking power for themselves from the others than actually overthrowing the UNSC. The only exceptions to that were Castilla and a prominent business man based here, in Angel city: Michael Hammond.

Mac owed him his live, as did Graves and Barker. When they had first managed to contact the Insurrectionist informant, Hammond had vouched for their integrity, and he and Castilla had taken them under their wings, with Mac and Graves going with Castilla, while Barker was hired by Hammond to be a pilot.

Graves and Mac had done well under Castilla. While the council was often complacent in what they did, Captain Castilla was known to sometimes engage the UNSC on her own initiative. And Graves and Mac were, for some reason, always on the frontline. They had fought for years alongside her, and Graves and Mac had gained both experience and trust from the other insurrectionists, to the point Graves was allowed to command a Paris-class frigate, the appropriately named _Guardian Angel_ , with Mac serving as his XO.

They were currently on the planet, waiting for Callista's word that they were going out in the field again, when Graves overheard that there was a siege in the Warehouse district near the harbor, and that a single woman had killed over 24 insurrectionists before being cornered there. They had her surrounded, and while they kept their distance, they also made sure she couldn't escape. The sewers were blocked off by special forces, the air was surrounded by Hornet gunships, and the buildings surrounding the woman's hideout were filled with explosives. In short, she was trapped. The only reason Mac could think of that explained why they weren't already swarming the warehouse she was trapped in was because it would cause a lot of casualties.

And yet Graves insisted that they go take a look, and he had run of into said direction, without explaining why. And Mac, being the fool that he was, followed him on his heels.

Mac cared more for Graves than for anyone else, to the point they knew each other better than their respective parents. They were practically brothers, despite the fact Graves had dark skin and Mac was white. But they didn't care. They were friends, and they looked out for each other.

Which was why, despite the fact Graves could get hurt there, Mac was following him.

Mac finally managed to catch up, as they were nearly at the siege location. Mac tapped him on his shoulder. "Care to explain the hurry?" Mac asked, panting.

Graves nodded, but he didn't say more, saving his breath for running instead of talking.

They finally got to the nearest patrol car, which was parked in front of a Hammond Corporations warehouse. Graves caught his breath, and then turned to Mac. "A single woman taking out two dozen of our own? While she was surrounded and outgunned? Doesn't that remind you of something?"

Mac looked confused for a minute. What the hell was Graves going on about? Graves noticed his puzzled look, and answered Mac's unspoken question. "The reason we defected. Halsey's pet project.

Mac looked up in surprise. Graves and Mac had defected when Graves had been recruited to transport kidnapped children for ONI to Reach, and, after Graves learned the true purpose of the kidnapping, he had told Mac. They had subsequently defected from the UNSC, not able to tolerate ONI's shenanigans any longer.

"You sure?" Mac finally asked. "It could be any kind of special forces personnel from ONI."

"How about the reports she flipped a car onto a pair of patrol officers? Considered that?" Graves retorted angrily.

Mac couldn't blame him. For years, Graves has had nightmares about the kidnapping, and the Spartan program was a sensitive subject for him. And, if Mac was honest to himself, he hadn't considered it.

"Fair enough." Mac finally said, and he saw Graves calm a bit. "But what are you planning to do? Just walk in there and ask her to surrender? Because I don't believe she will."

"Indeed not" the leader of the police force surrounding the warehouse said. It looks like they were now without privacy to discuss the subject. "We offered her that choice, and in response she shot three of my best men. She's a freak."

Mac wanted to tell this man the truth about the Spartan program, just to shut him up. But it was a relatively unknown matter, and the man likely wouldn't believe him. Mac turned to Graves, wanting an answer to his question.

He wasn't there.

Mac frantically looked around, trying to spot him. And when he did, Mac's heart sank.

Graves had stepped through the perimeter established by the cops, and he was calmly walking towards the warehouse, his arms raised a bit to show he was unarmed. Mac tried to storm after him, when the patrol officer stopped him. "If he wants to get killed, let him. His fault."

Mac really wanted to punch the guy now. But he was right. The Police outranked him, and he would be breaching protocol if he went through. Graves had the clearance to break the perimeter, but Mac didn't. Mac only hoped Graves knew what he was doing.

* * *

 _What am I doing?_ Graves thought as he entered the warehouse and closed the door behind him.

He had broken the police perimeter, and had walked towards the warehouse. And since he was sure the Spartan could see him, he had held his arms up, showing that he had no hostile intent.

He had entered the warehouse, intent on seeing how the children had grown, but he had no idea what his goal was here. Could he convince her to surrender? Would she join him? Would she-

A gunshot hit the floor a few centimeters from his feet, and Graves looked up.

The woman was sitting on a support beam, with a magnum aimed at Graves. She had a slight burn mark on the side of her face, and Graves could see ONI had, quite literally, cut her open in order to perform the augmentations. She was short, had matte-black hair, though Graves was uncertain whether that was the genuine color, or if it was painted. She had green eyes, and a serious look on her face, edged with determination and anger. But Graves recognized the woman none the less.

It was Allison-116, the girl he had picked up from Meridian. One of the children whose face he had carved into his memory.

Allison spoke. "That's far enough, traitor. If you want to talk, you can talk from there."

Graves nodded. "sounds fair enough. But are you prepared to listen?"

The woman waited for a few seconds, and then holstered her pistol. "As long as it's something useful you have to say."

Graves chuckled to himself despite the situation. "Oh, I think you'll find this useful to know. Whether you want to _hear_ it, however, is another matter. It is about your current masters, ONI."

Allison tilted her head a bit. "I'm intrigued. What do you have to say." Graves also saw a flicker of doubt in her eyes, like she was trying to place something. _Could it be she recognized him?_

Graves decided to ask her himself. "Do you know who I am, aside from an insurrectionist?"

The Spartan looked at him, and then, though it lasted only for a microsecond, Graves saw a flicker of recognition cross her face. "Weren't you the pilot of the ship that took me to Reach?"

Graves wanted to fall onto his knees and Cry. Him remembering the Spartans wasn't in vain. _They Recognized him!_

Outwardly, however, he sighed, and turned to her. "Yes." he said, his voice heavy with regret. "You were taken from your parents, and given no choice about your life. You were kidnapped, taken to Reach, and forced to become one of ONI's super-weapons against the insurrection." He paused. "You, and all of your brothers and sisters. Taken without a say in where to, or when you could see your parents again. Without a chance to say goodbye. Withou-"

"Enough!" he heard a yell. And Graves was surprised it came from Allison.

And she was crying. With her face being a mix of anger, sadness and desperation.

"You don't know how it was. We were given a purpose. We would be the protectors of Earth and all of her colonies. We-"

"Weren't allowed to make your own choices. What if you want to retire? What then? You think ONI will let you go?"

Allison was silent again. Apparently, she had thought about this matter before.

"And what about _you_?" she finally managed after a few minutes. "You defected from the UNSC. You betrayed us. How are you any better?"

"I try to make up for my sins every single day!" Graves retorted. "I hold the ideals of the UNSC just as highly as you do! Hell, likely even more so! What made me leave is what they did to all of YOU! You, kidnapped as children, experimented on to become super-soldiers! All of it by that blasted ONI!"

Tears were starting to stream down Graves' face, as he fell back into one of his moments of anger and regret. "I care for all of you, like I would for my own child, Goddammit! But ONI Ruined all of you! Taking your choice away! And for what?! So ONI CAN CONSOLIDATE IT'S CONTROL OVER THE UNIVERSE?!"

Graves paused for breath. Allison was watching silently, her own tears still streaming down her face. "I want the world for you, and all of your brothers and sisters. Believe me, I do. But-"

"Stop." Allison finally said. She jumped down from the beam she was sitting on. She walked up to Graves. Graves stood still for a moment, unsure what she would do.

Then she dropped her magnum. And she unholstered and dropped a hidden knife as well.

"I believe you."

Graves nodded, and held his arms open. And she hugged him, her tears now streaming down her face. She then truly started crying, not the few meager tears that he had glimpsed earlier. After a while, Graves joined her in crying, and he held her like he would his own daughter, despite the fact she was at least half a head taller than him. After a few minutes, she finally broke it, and looked at him. "You don't know, do you? The effects of the augmentations?"

Graves was puzzled for a moment. "You mean aside from the fact it increased your strength and speed?"

Allison just shook her head. "About half of us died because their bodies rejected the augmentations, and a dozen more ended up crippled."

A part of Graves wanted to shout out in anger, cursing ONI and the doctor that led the program. They were responsible for these children's suffering. She deserved to be tortured, to die a slow and painful death.

But the other, more rational and emotional part of Graves, prevailed. He had done research on the people that led the Program, a Doctor Halsey, a Doctor van Conroy, and a Chief Mendez. And despite the fact they did these things, they still cared for said Spartans, and van Conroy even hinted in a few of his logs, that Graves had had intercepted, that he was experimenting with letting the Spartans have more personality and more emotions, to the point that some could even fall in love. Graves even had confirmation that the latter had already happened with Team Black. That didn't excuse what they did, but it showed they at least cared, as he knew some at ONI never would.

Graves, in the end, merely looked up. "I admit I didn't know. But I promise you, they'll all be remembered, alive or dead, crippled or sprinting. I won't forget them. And as long as even a single person doesn't forget them, they won't die."

Allison nodded, and got up. "They'll either consider me a traitor, or think I'm dead, depending on how we go about this. And even still, the majority of the people here won't trust me. And when will I see my brothers and sisters again?"

Marcus just smiled. "I trust you. My friend Mac, who's just outside, trusts you. My commanding officer, Lyrenne Castilla, trusts you. You are not alone. And as you said, if we do this right, everyone will believe you died."

Allison gave him a confused look. Graves, catching on, explained his plan. After he finished, she smiled. "I admit: I like it. But then again, I am the pyromaniac among my siblings."

Graves nodded. "I suspect you would. I'll see you there."

* * *

Mac had had enough of it. Graves was in there for about an hour, and most of their crew were coming along as well, after Mac has messaged them for help. The main engineer, Thomas McGregor, walked up to MacAllen. "When do you think he'll come out?"

If Mac had an answer, Mac would have given one. Instead, the two men stared at the surrounded warehouse. Mac was about to restart the conversation...

When the warehouse exploded, and debris flew in all directions. Mac and Thomas ducked for a moment. Mac looked back. Could he truly be-

No. a single man stumbled out. He was stumbling outwards, and was slightly disoriented. But Mac immediately recognized him. It was Graves.

Mac immediately ran over to him. Thomas and a few others ran over to him as well. "Are you alright?"

After a few seconds, Graves nodded. But then he immediately looked behind him.

And froze. Standing there, looking at them, was Captain Lyrenne Castilla, their commanding officer.

She stepped over to them. "Care to explain that, Graves? Just running into a building-under-siege like that? For all your tactical and strategical genius, that was a foolish move. Even for you."

to Mac's surprise, Graves just smiled. "and here I thought you liked foolish people."

Castilla gave a chuckle. "Nice try. But I'm already married." she held up her right hand and ring-finger to empathize her point. "My point is, don't run into buildings like that. Oh, and your... package has been taken care off. Don't worry. She'll have a place on your ship. I still have enough influence on the council for that."

Graves nodded, and Mac saw him visibly lower his shoulders in relief. Mac looked at him, perplexed. Graves started to talk, but Castilla stopped him. "It's a private matter. He may discuss it with you, but not out here, in the open."

Mac nodded, satisfied for the moment. But he and Graves were going to talk, that's for sure.

Castilla finally moved away to oversee the clean-up of the warehouse. Mac and Graves moved back to their apartment building in the outskirts of Angel-City.

Unknown to MacAllen, however, a women was moving through the ventilation system of the warehouse district, which was connected to every single warehouse, and hadn't been locked off by the insurgent police force.

* * *

Graves had just locked his door, after explaining to Mac what had happened. It took a little bit, but he had managed to convince Mac that it was the right to do. Graves turned around.

And, as expected, she was standing there, having arrived without a sound. Graves smiled.

Allison did as well. "You're early." she said.

"You're late." Graves retorted, though the smile on his face betrayed his humorous intentions.

"Then we're both on time." she said. Graves had no true answer to that. He walked over to the kitchen counter. "Want a drink? Milk? Tea? Coffee?"

she shook her head. "No, thanks. I'll wait until Castilla gets that formula for high-calorie food and drinks Spartans require. We require more calories, proteins and such than normal humans."

Graves nodded. "Fair enough. Want anything else? Fresh pair of clothes? Because crawling through vents doesn't really keep your clothes clean."

she nodded. "Get me some civilian clothes tomorrow. Extra large."

Graves raised an eyebrow. Allison sighed. "Yes, I'm shorter than I should be. But I'm still taller than most humans."

"Alright. And don't worry. Castilla can be trusted. So can Mac. They won't tell your secret, and your face was never properly spotted on camera. You're safe."

"I know. I still don't like it we had to reveal to her the entirety of the Spartan Program, though. Most of that stuff's private."

"I only revealed enough so you come across as sincere. Relax."

Allison shrugged. She looked out the window, which had a good view of Troy's only sea. "I already miss them. All of them. Kurt. John. Linda." she paused for a minute. "And Fred."

Graves perked up a bit. "You two close?"

"As twin brother and sister. I looked after him, despite the fact he was taller than me. I made fires for him and the others during training, stole a few air-tanks for him during our training mission to Emerald Cove."

Graves' eyebrows raised. "Emerald Cove? I want to hear this."

Allison smiled. "maybe for another time." she then got up. "But in the meantime, there's someone talking with his little girl of about 2 years, and they're headed this way, so I'm going to the bathroom."

Graves nodded. "Of course. I'll make it short."

Allison nodded, and moved out of the living room. Sure enough, after about ten seconds the doorbell went. Graves went to open the door.

To Graves' surprise, the chief engineer of his ship stood at the door, Thomas McGregor. He was cradling his 2 year old daughter.

"Graves. Sorry I'm coming over at this late an hour, but can we talk? It's a personal matter."

Graves gestured for him to come in. He did so. Graves walked to the kitchen to get him a glass, but Thomas stopped him. "I won't stay long. But this is urgent."

Graves nodded, grabbed himself a glass of water. "What is it?"

Thomas sighed. "I will be brief, for I haven't got a lot of time. I will be shipped to the world of Sephora tomorrow, to help the local 'Sephoran Guard' get their tech up and running. Thing is, I can't take Sarah here with me."

Thomas looked back up at Graves. "The Planet has a large amount of criminals, and a lot of insurrectionist that only rebel in order to get away with murder go there. The op will likely end up being a suicide-mission." Thomas sighed again. "I know people here will look after her. But she needs someone she can trust. Someone who can guide her, or teach her. Someone who helps her no matter what."

Graves was... surprised, to say the least. He had barely known Thomas for six months, and yet here the man was, asking him to look after his daughter after he was gone. That was quite a responsibility.

Then again, looking after Allison was quite a job as well.

"I'll help her. She might want to do things differently, but I'll look after her and support her no matter what."

Thomas' shoulders sagged in relief. "Thank you. You don't know _how_ _much_ this means to me."

Graves chuckled. "I wouldn't be too sure of that." Graves then stood up, and shook Thomas' hand, likely for the final time. "Take care out there. Good luck."

Thomas smiled, and looked a lot happier. "You too, Captain. Or, with your skill, it could be admiral tomorrow."

Graves chuckled. "If the Council grew some serious leadership skills, they just might. But that only happens when hell freezes over."

"indeed. Good night, Graves. And may the dead sing fortune to your soul."

Graves nodded, and Thomas and his girl left. After a few moments, Allison returned. "That was kind, taking up that kind of responsibility."

Graves smiled. "Well, I'm gonna get a lot of practice anyway, considering you wanted me to adopt you as my daughter." Graves said with a smile. "And little Spartans can be quite a handful until they leave the house."

Allison took on a look of mock offense. "I crawled through antiquated, rusty, dirty ventilation systems for hours, I've had no time to clean up at all, and you insult me?"

Graves smiled. "So? Can't Allison Graves protect herself from a few insolent remarks from a naval officer?"

Allison just smiled. "point. Well, until ms. Castilla has arranged for an apartment of my own, I'll sleep on your couch."

Graves shook his head. "You take the bed. You've had a rough day. You've earned a proper rest."

Allison nodded, and was about to walk to the bedroom. Then Graves remembered something. "Oh, and one more thing." he got to the kitchen, and pulled open a closet. He pulled away a few frying pans, and pulled out a box. After a moment of rummaging he pulled out his memento of Allison: a Pendant of a flame, made of gold, platinum and, to Graves' surprise, minerals from ancient meteors and old dinosaur bones. It was more expensive than a Paris-class frigate, so either Allison was a highly skilled thief, or her parents were very rich. He held it out to her.

"This was yours. I found it in a hidden compartment when I left with that Albatross, and I've kept it ever since."

Allison took it, and held it up in the light. The cord of it was leather, and Graves knew it wouldn't fit her anymore.

Then she surprised him, and pulled out her dog-tags. She removed the leather cord, and added the pendant to her dog-tags. She looked at it again, and smiled. "Thank you." she then went into the bedroom. Graves smiled for a moment, before he grabbed a blanket, and lay down on the couch.

Despite the fact this was an... odd day, to say the least, he knew it would be one of the best of his life.

* * *

 _A titan has been redeemed, and the pawn has been given more responsibilities._

 _The first steps to his great destiny have been made._

* * *

 **Great kings can come from the unlikeliest of people. as can the greatest enemies.**

 **Be mindful of what you read**

 **Gharst Omenlumin**


	7. Epilogue 2: Our judge, Jury, Executioner

**Never assume that just because someone is unheard of, they can't hurt you. for while fear, as shown by the Covenant, is a powerful tool, hate is unstoppable.**

 **and I, Gharst Omenlumin, won't ever stop.**

* * *

Epilogue 2: Our judge, Our jury, Our executioner

* * *

Location; Sangheili colony of Ute'k Mardee

Date: 10-03-2531

* * *

Ute'k Mardee Military Drydocks Air Traffic Control tower

Marshal Batonee looked on, as his soldiers did their work, guiding the local traffic around the drydocks. He went back to his own task.

Until recently, Batonee had been a Sangheili High Councilor, working with others to ensure the policies of the Hierarchs went smoothly as planned. When the council had banned Gharst Omenlumin from High-Charity for his treason, he had let it happen, due to the fact, despite the amount of ships he had commanded, he had no real influence on the council. he had, during the war with the humans, glassed a planet prematurely, resulting in the destruction of a sacred Forerunner site. And now, everyone looked at him with disgust, and would rarely listen.

So, when the Prophet of Mercy had quietly asked him to retire on one of the outlying Sangheili colonies, Batonee had taken the opportunity.

And now here he was, overseeing the storage of surplus Covenant warships that would soon likely be taken from him, to be used in the war against the humans.

An alarm went off at the long range sensor station, and he came to look.

"Sire, we have 15 ships exit slipspace 50.000 kilometers outside of our perimeter." The sensor officer reported.

Batinee looked at the configuration as well. The fleet consisted of 12 corvettes and 3 battlecruisers, all headed for the drydocks.

"Alert the Shipyards." He said. "We shall meet these 'imposters' with the full might of our fleet."

During the last few weeks, a group of ships similar to this group had been raiding Sangheili colonies for food and other supplies, often leaving the planets burning when there was nothing more to be found. And he would not let that happen to Ute'k Mardee.

"Sire, the Flagship is hailing us." The communications officer said."

 _Likely the pirates' demand that they surrender, he thought._ "Accept." He said.

A single phrase came over in old sangheili, one he hadn't heard of in years.

"I come on peace. Gharst." It said.

Batonee rushed over to the comm officer. "Tell our fleet to stand down. Prepare the city to welcome old friends."

The Sangheili turned to him. "But Sire, there have been reported pirates targeting our sector, and-"

"Nonsense." Batonee said. "give me a direct connection to the Flagship."

The elite nodded, but he didn't look Batonee in the eye afterwards. "as you wish, Sir."

Batonee went to the main view display, and sure enough, a Sangheili in Fiield-Marshal armor appeared in front of him. Though the Elite was technically a Fleetmaster, he had the option of dressing as he wished. And that included it's armor.

Or the colors, as Gharst had painted his in black and yellow.

Batonee laughed, as Gharst Omenlumin appeared. "By the gods. Fleetmaster Omenlumin himself. How have you been, old friend?"

"Batonee."the slightly distorted voice said. "I see you still have your _glass first, look for Artifacts later_ Attitude." Gharst said, and let out a laugh of his own. "I've been good, friend. Heard this sector was crawling with Pirates who decided to give you a visit."

"Nothing that the might of the Covenant can't handle." Batonee said proudly.

"Indeed." Gharst said. "We've been on patrol for a month, and have been unable to find these raiders. We're running low on provisions, need energy cells recharged. May we seek sanctuary upon your world?"

"Of course, Of course."Batonee said, eager to meet with his old friend again. "I'll will relay you the coordinates of our planetary drydocks, so we can meet face-to-face after so much time apart, Brother. We have a lot to catch up on."

"My thanks to you, brother. I will see you planetside."

* * *

Ute'k Mardee Planetary drydocks main entrance, 30 minutes later.

Batonee came riding in on his Revenant, a lot happier than he was earlier.

Gharst's ships were already arriving at the dry-docks, and Batonee was eager to see his old friend, his brother, again.

He had donned his old, Blue General armor, from back to his old days of being a Sangheili army general. It was a symbol, a remembrance of the old days.

As he got out, Batonee saw Gharst had already arrived, and was busy securing his Banshee to the ground and properly powering it down. Batonee waited as Gharst finished up, and then moved over to him as Gharst marched towards him. From the corner of his eye, Batonee thought he saw three figures moving, two of which had the shape of humans. _Could they have infiltrated his defenses?_

Nonsense, he dismissed himself. Humanity has never set a foothold here, due to how deep this colony lay in Covenant territory. He dismissed it as a trick of the light, and turned his attention back to Gharst.

They stopped a few meters from each other. Batonee looked his old friend over. "My, my." he said, as a way to open up the conversation. "Were the years kind to you, Gharst?"

"Yes." Gharst said, all cheeriness from earlier gone from his voice. Instead, it was filled with… Anger? _It couldn't be._ "They were."

Before Batonee knew it, he was pulled forwards by Gharst, and he suddenly felt a very sharp, burning pain in his abdomen. He gurgled, as he felt a lot of blood rising up in his throat.

He looked down, as he heard a single Ballistic shot in the background, followed closely by an explosion. And he knew he wasn't going to walk out of here.

Gharst had embedded an Energy sword into his abdomen, and it went all the way through his body, exiting from his back. And the guards he had brought along? They wouldn't help him. Gharst had outmaneuvered him, having his men kill Batonee's own, and it had all happened in less than three seconds.

 _Did he have demons on his side? NO!_

"Could… you?!" he managed, despite the pain. "You… were like a Broth…ther to me."

"I'm no Brother to you, parasite."Gharst said, his voice heavy with anger, resentment and pleasure at Batonee's suffering. As if to add to the insult, he stabbed his blade, still inside Batonee's stomach, a little deeper. Batonee gurgled, as he felt the pain increase tremendously, if such a thing was possible.

"You should have listened to your _warriors_. And now, they're all at my mercy." Gharst said.

"Why?" Batonee asked.

"Your life was mine. Now, I take it back." He twisted the blade, turning it. Batonee, despite the agony, only managed a few grunts. It was all he could do not to scream. And that would have been an outrage.

"If it makes it any easier," Gharst continued "You are the last one. This blade went through all. _All of them._ "

Batonee tried to turn his head, to look Gharst in the eye. But Gharst had him in a tight grip, and he was losing the strength to break it. "Mon… ster." He managed after a second.

"Yes."Gharst retorted. "I am." With that, Gharst withdrew the blade, and let go of him. He fell down in pain, holding his stomach. After a second of trembling to control himself, he looked up at his killer. "Stop." he pleaded.

But Gharst wasn't listening to his begging. " _Those that beg for mercy aren't worthy of it._ Wasn't that what you once said to me, on that day? Or was it Tulam'ee that said it?" No matter. This is your end."

And with that, Gharst holstered his sword, and pulled out a human Assault Rifle.

And he fired a short burst into Batonee's face, and all he saw afterwards was darkness.

* * *

Gharst looked down upon Batonee's corpse for a second as it bled, before turning back to the hanger's exit, through which he had flown in. He looked out to the view, which wasn't that ugly.

After all, he enjoyed watching his ships land at the drydocks, and how they would take all of the ships in storage. If they were serviceable, at least. "Our ships have reached dry-docks." Jan Coldrun reported. "and it's a goldmine out here."

"Jan, I want those ships taken over _now_. Kill all in your way." Gharst ordered. "Of course." Jan acknowledged, before he went silent, to go on about his task.

Gharst was glad Jan was with him. Jan was the only survivor of Gharst's old crews, and, as it turned out, an excellent logistics expert and fleet officer. He, alongside Gregory Recko, were Gharst's second in command in all matters. Gharst valued Jan greatly, and would miss him if he ever died in battle or of old age.

A single step was all he heard, but he knew they were standing there. Recko's proudest creation.

The three members of Achilles unit.

When Gharst's sources had learned of the Spartan program, Recko had dedicated himself to creating his own version of it. Gharst, seeing the potential of an army of super soldiers, hadn't resisted. But Recko and his team of scientists hadn't been able to fully replicate the genetic augmentations, and they had resorted more and more to Cybernetic implants to augment strength, hearing, eyesight and reflexes. And, though they were still in the early stage of the 'Cerberus-Program', Recko had assured him that once finished, the Cerberus soldiers would be able to go toe-to-toe with the Spartan-II's.

And Achilles Unit, the first three successful Cerberus soldiers, had just proven Recko right, by taking down Batonee's escort of twenty soldiers in less than three seconds. All with a single well-placed Sniper shot, a rocket launched at the Revenant, and the third member in position to pick off any stragglers at close range. Gharst made a mental note to provide Recko with more funding to upgrade the Cerberus program, and so he could have more… _Volunteers_.

A human Falcon gunship came down upon them, and landed a few meters in front of Gharst. Gharst saw it was one of his own, with their symbol of a Sangheili skull on the foreground, a shield on the back, and a pair of combat knives placed as crossbones in between, visible on the side. Recko jumped out of the passenger bay.

Recko himself had served as the guinea-pig, as he'd called it, donning the first version of Cerberus armor. Taken from a dead Spartan on Harvest, Recko had improved it, making it twice as thick with twice as tough materials, yet giving it back only a third of it's weight. The helmet, an old operator's helmet of the Reach variety, Recko had improved on the optics, greatly improving the HUD-systems and durability, and doubling the visual range on the other sides. The only backdraw was that it was expensive to produce, hence why there were currently only about a dozen Cerberus soldiers.

But with what Gharst saw today, he and Recko would ensure there would be many more.

Recko walked over to Gharst, briefly admiring the carnage his Cerberus units had caused behind him.

"Recko, march into the city." Gharst ordered as Recko arrived. "Raid everything. Food storages, weapon depots, Hospitals, banks… leave _nothing_ to these _mongrels_."

"Recko nodded, apathic about the slaughter he would cause. "What of civilians?"

"No unnecessary casualties. The Covenant will take care of that."

"And what if they riot?"

"Then their choice is clear. Defend yourselves."

Recko nodded, and he and the Cerberus units would invade the city, and take anything of value. The Legionary Armada's reserves would greatly increase with this raid. And, if the usual procedures were followed, his men would raid the prisons, free the inmates.

And find new recruits among them for conversion.

Today was a lovely day.

* * *

Outskirts of Capital city of Cesef-fys, Ute'k Mardee, one hours later.

Halno Orthelkee looked on, as his men marched upon the capital city, and coincidentally one of only three cities, of Ute'k Mardee. They waited just out of eyesight, waiting for commander Gharst's signal.

And, as usual, the commander came through.

"Citizens of Ute'k Mardee." The PA systems called out."Your leader- this pathetic excuse of a being- now lies dead in a pool of his own blood. Your fleets are under my command, your warriors are in disarray, and my soldiers march through your cities."

Halno always reveled at these parts. Gharst was charismatic, smart, and a great tactician, slowly building up his fleets by raiding under-prepared human and Sangheili colonies, killing the civilians, and yet taking in those that had been imprisoned on said colonies. The prisoners, grateful at being resued, always accepted the offer of joining the legion, whether they were psychopathic murderers or merely avoided paying taxes for too long, as he'd heard happen to one of his men. And those taken in were all converted, through a rough training regime, into Legion Stormtroopers who could handle nearly anything thrown at them.

Even if their armor was outdated Sangheili Spec-ops armor and salvaged ODST armor plating.

"You have a choice."Gharst continued on. "Let us conduct our business in peace, and we'll leave this _wretched_ world. But _dare_ to intervene, and I will glass this piece of rock until there's nothing left to glass. The choice is yours."

Gharst ended his usual speech, and the PA system shut off.

It was also the cue for Halno and his men to invade the city.

They marched on, driving the civilians into hiding, and the stragglers being shot.

Halno and his men, leaving the legions to loot the city, made their way to the city's prison. They arrived at the main door. Halno raised the Commander. "Commander, we have reached the first prison."

"Search the data." Came the immediate response. "Anyone who does not fit the profile must be exterminated. Major Recko will be at your location in mere minutes. I want you to be ready by then."

The Captain hesitated for only a small moment. Major Gregory Recko, the first human of the legion, the scourge of Sephora, was coming here? The father of Cerberus would see him in action. He could be seen as impressive, and even be accepted into Cerberus, as many hoped to be!

But a few minutes was a damn small time window. "I shall begin at once!" he said, before shutting of the com, not wishing to distract the commander any longer than necessary. He turned to his men, counting from his hand in silence. His men, getting the cue, primed their grenades. After a moment, they threw in the Flashbangs, and they went in, shooting down the heavy opposition despite being outnumbered. The defending Elites, due to being caught of guard both by the suddenness and swiftness of the assault, were killed in less than ten seconds of continuous fire. Halno and the twenty others went in after them, mopping up the survivors and shooting the corpses, just in case.

Halno turned to his soldiers. For many of their enemies today, the golden visor of the Stormtroopers would be the last thing they ever saw.

"Sweep the facility." He ordered them.

"Yes, sir, came the reply from the human sergeant, his voice devoid of the hate common to humans.

It wasn't surprising that most humans hated his kind, with the covenant exterminating them on Genocidal levels. But everyone was accepted in the Legion, no matter the species, and command was granted on capability, rather than being bought off, as was the case among the higher ranks of the Covenant. It wasn't uncommon in the legion for an Unggoy to be commanding a legion, or Elites, Jiralhanae and Humans to be playing a cardgame together, or Yanm'ee and Huragok to be working alongside each other in peace.

As such, Halno's command was mixed with Elites and Humans. And they all worked quickly and efficiently.

They came across no resistance for a few minutes, the guards waiting for them in other sections.

Then Halno rounded a corner, and immediately rolled to the nearest pillar, as he came under concentrated fire from down the corridor. He risked a glance.

The guards, being outnumbered, had hoped to catch the assailants in a bottleneck just outside the prison control room. A valiant attempt.

But hopeless against the Legion.

A single guard broke rank, and stormed them. One of the humans, Rocky, he'd heard him called, met his charge with one of his own.

And jumped up at the last second, before kicking down the Sangheili and landing on its head, crushing it. Rocky turned around and returned to the ranks of his own men, firing backpedaling as he went.

Halno and the others moved up, as the Guards seemed to be faltering. Apparently they hadn't expected their assailants would fight on, and were retreating into the control room.

But one of the Elites, Baka, moved ahead, along with Rocky and their companion, 'Lazor', into the control room, with the latter two covering Baka as he launched a grenade into the room, killing all occupants.

Soon, after the rest of the Stormtroopers secured the room, they moved through the prison, securing areas and unleashing prisoners as they went, only to send them to the screening, the selection proces to determine who would make excellent Legionnaires. The occasional surviving guard would be sent to the Control room, to be executed. Baka, Rocky and Lazor, as the three called each other, sorted through the data, looking for anomalies.

A final Legionnaire, who had the warden under shot, moved into the Control room. "Sir, the prison's been searched, and the warden is the last one unaccounted for. There's one area that can only be accessed from the Control room, but it seemed abandoned."

Halno nodded, and turned to the three that were searching the database. "One of you look up the area he's talking about, and unlock it. The others continue searching." he turned back to the legionnaire. "Line him up with the others, and fire on my command."

the Stormtrooper nodded, and he moved the warden so he joined the line. Halno followed, and, after the Warden was lined up as well, gave the order.

"Fire."

as one unit, the soldiers opened fire on the surrendered guards. They all went down into a pile. Halno turned to two of them. "Move the corpses to a Trash Compactor, and clean up the blood. The Major will be coming, and I don't want too great a mess of this place to be here. Everyone else move to aid with the screening."

"Yes, Captain." they all said.

Halno then returned to looking at the data the three were sorting.

"Look at this." Rocky said. "Murderers, Heretics, political adversaries: this guy didn't allow a lot of these folks."

"Easy when doing the Prophet's work." Baka said. "You can use any excuse to lock anyone up on a remote colony like this. Listen to this: Executed for 'desecrating the Holy Shrine of the Arbiter'."

"Cut the chatter." Halno interrupted. "Major Recko will be here in mere minutes, and I don't want you to spoil my acceptance into Cerberus."

One of the three, Lazor, briefly looked over his shoulder. "Relax, Captain. He's just a rookie. Besides, if anything happens, our Spec-ops boys will get there first."

Halno nodded. "For your own sake you'd better be wrong, or I foresee the _holy_ duty of scraping dung off my hooves."

Then Halno heard steps approaching from down the hallway, and he turned to look.

And immediately felt the urge to stand at attention. Major Recko was approaching, his assault rifle held in hand. For his high rank, Recko never shied away from combat. Halno would have bet his salary that Recko had hoped it wouldn't be secured, so he would see some combat himself.

Being the overseer of the Cerberus-Program could be a boring job in these stages, perfecting cybernetic enhancements and experimenting with creating good armor.

Halno gave a salute as Recko entered the control room. The major returned it. "What have we got?" he asked.

"Data's uploaded to the scanner. We'll be sorting the inmates momentarily. All guards have been eliminated, and the prison's under our control except for a single door that won't open."

Recko nodded in approval, and moved to the main screen, overlooking it. Halno joined him.

"Sir, that sector that won't open up?" Lazor said. "It's not on the central power grid, and I've just discovered that a pair of guards there are overlooking a pair of cells. Only one is occupied."

"I want them disposed of." Recko said. Lazor nodded, and brought up the indicated area. Indeed, the power came from outside the prison, and the section, which consisted for the most part of nothing but stairs, was quite far below ground.

"Those must be the Extreme Isolation cells." Halno noted. "They are so deep underground they probably don't know what's going on."

this seemed to interest Recko. "Who is in the cell?"

After a moment, however, they had no results. "No name or occupation. Nothing. Like the guy in charge didn't want this guy to escape."

Recko looked at it for another second, before he turned to the others. "You two" he pointed at Baka and Lazor, who was holding the scanner with the data. "Sort the screening."

"Yes sir." both immediately said.

Recko turned to Halno. "Captain, you're with me. We're going down there, and find out what Batonee found so interesting about this guy."

"Yes sir." Halno said, as he led the way. He couldn't help but overhear as Recko reported to the Commander. "Gharst. We've got something... _peculiar_ in the first prison."

"Let us hope it is something we can use." Gharst answered. "So far this rock costs me more than it gives back."

"I would not say so." the final man of the triumvirate, Commander Jan Coldrun said. "We've got 10 Corvettes and 6 Cruisers. I think we're profiting already."

"Recko, report once you've finished with the prison. Jan, I want that fleet in position to Glass by dusk."

Recko nodded, and signed off. Halno refocused his efforts on performing well in front of the major. His career depended on it, after all.

* * *

"He's good. Next." Lazor said, as he called the next from the line of inmates forward.

Gerard Miles, or 'Lazor' to his fellow Stormtroopers, held the scanner as it read the chip implanted in every Covenant prisoner, and sorted through the data. His job, along with Baka's, was to ensure the sorting of the prisoners went well. Everyone who had committed no sexual assaults, racism, or other things that discouraged working together would be led to a central square in the Capital city, while the others would be led to the Purge-camps, where they would be killed. Most of the inmates wouldn't be that violent, though.

But, as usual, there were exceptions. "Ah, aren't you special." he said. "What is it, three counts of rape?"

The Elite just grumbled. Lazor turned to his colleague, Baka.

"Hey, Baka. What did they do to rapists, back on Sanghelios?"

Baka seemed to think about it for a second. "I think they spread the jaws as wide as possible while the rapist was tied up. Then they inserted a very specific type of insect. Then they sewed the Jaws closed as tightly as possible. It _ate_ you from the inside, very slowly. The spectacle was transmitted for a whole day."

"Barbaric." Lazor said, in mock horror. He turned back to the prisoner. "You're lucky we're marked 'humane'." he turned to two of the many Stormtroopers present. "Put him in the purger camp."

the elite grumbled even more, as he was led away.

Baka nodded. "Barbaric, yes. But it _was_ amusing." he pointed with his Grenade Launcher at Lazor's scanner. "The more important question is: how is that _Spartan_ _Laser_ a scanner?"

Lazor could understand. When the legion had learned the UNSC was building laser-based technology, the Legion had stolen copies of the blueprints, and converted a few for their own purposes.

As, in Lazor's case, a portable scanner for Prisoner chips.

"Change the intensity, reprogram the screen, and upload the data, basically. And voila: you've got yourself a portable scanner. Hold it down a bit too long and you'll _burn_ the eyes out, though."

Baka nodded, impressed. "Ah, gruesome." he said apprehensively.

Lazor nodded, and they went back to sorting the prisoners.

* * *

Halno and Recko were descending the final set of Stairs, and were coming up on the Isolation guards mess hall. The cells were just beyond, with only a small corridor in between. At the moment, only two guards occupied the room.

Recko nodded at one, pointed at Halno, then at the other and himself. Halno understood, and quietly made his way to said guard, avoiding the gaze of the other as he did. When he was close enough, he activated his Energy Cutlass built into his gauntlet, and stabbed into the Elite's neck, cutting the bone in two. It fell down, dead as it hit the floor.

Recko took care of the other, as he jumped onto the other, his knife penetrating the eye, behind which was a vital nerve and an artery. It was also dead as both landed quietly on the floor.

The two got up, and headed to the cells on this level.

At the moment, four guards were on duty, with two guarding the cell while two others patrolled the room.

Halno moved to one, who was stopping at a corner. He put his arm around it and pulled it down, exposing the elite's stomach. Before the Elite could utter a sound, Halno stabbed down with his cutlass into the Sangheili's stomach, silencing it as it fell down, bleeding out.

Halno looked. The guards at the cell, which was further down the room, were looking at the cell rather than outside. Like they expected the prisoner to try to escape, and not expecting a mass-breakout. Were they that stupid?

 _Or that afraid of the prisoner?_

Recko, in the meantime, had sprinted up to the other, jumped onto it's back, and, using the strength granted to him by the Cerberus modifications and the armor, snapped it's neck.

It let out a single shot from it's plasma repeater, though, and the other two Guards were alerted to their presence. They turned around and opened fire on the intruders.

But Halno and Recko had superior armor, despite the origins of it. The Legion always put in upgraded energy shielding into it's armor, and their weaponry was always the best of the best, so their soldiers would stand a chance.

The Guards didn't, as they were cut down in seconds, caught with their personal shields down.

Halno and Recko walked over to the cell. Inside, facing away from them, lay an Elite Major on it's stomach, unconscious. It showed signs of being physically weak and exhausted.

Halno saw Recko walk up to the shield, to the point he could put his hand to it if he wanted to. "Hmmm. So what's his story?" Recko asked.

Halno complied, and activated the data pedestal that stood next to the cell. Halno read what was written about him as it came up. And Halno was... shocked. These acts could be attributed to a Spartan-II. "Hijacked a Corvette, rammed a BattleCruiser. Got inside and... tore the entire hanger bay apart with a Scarab?"

He briefly looked between the prisoner and the data pedestal. There was no way this weakling could have done all that.

 _Could he?_

"He's out of his mind."

"Name?" Recko asked.

"No name, but a little bit of trivial data's here. He's just branded a heretic. Surprisingly his medical history's here. Punctured lungs, heavy concussion and some damage to his eyes. Prior to his Hijacking he'd been in prison for the last five years."

Halno looked at Recko. And he was looking at the Major.

And admiring him. And now, Halno started to understand Recko's interest.

"Weak." Recko started. "Wounded. Blind. And yet able to do so much damage, escape, and man a Cruiser all by himself." and Recko seemed to laugh a bit. "There's an MO for that back on Earth. Interesting." Recko finally turned to the captain. "Get him back to the Flagship. I want him back on his feet. He might be useful."

The Captain nodded, and set out to make the necessary arrangements. Before he could do so, Recko spoke again.

"Oh, and one more thing Captain. I've seen you in action. I've read your reports. Rest assured, while there currently isn't more funding to get more than the soldiers we have, as soon as more funding is available you will be accepted."

Halno stopped in his tracks. _Could it be?_

"Welcome to Cerberus, Halno Orthelkee." Recko said. "I'm certain you will do well here."

Halno was glad, and on the verge of becoming ecstatic. But he wouldn't show it in front of the major. "Thank you, sir."

Recko nodded. "It'll be a few months before you will be called. But when you are, be ready."

Oh, Halno would be. He would make sure he would be.

* * *

Cesef-fys city square, Sangheili colony of Ute'k Mardee, one day later.

Gharst's Falcon landed at the square, and he got off to speak with his new potential recruits.

Jan had placed the Fleets into position to glass the entire planet if necessary. But Gharst didn't expect that he would meet much resistance. Since Ute'k Mardee was a small colony, the Legionary Armada had made a record, and gotten everything of value, be it a mere Plasma pistol or a SuperCarrier, one of which they'd actually found later on, off of the planet in under thirteen hours. And all of the prisoners from the three prisons across the planet had been gathered in this square, so Gharst could speak to them.

And Batonee had been a busy little snake. He had over twenty thousand prisoners, fifteen thousand of which fit the profile. They had all been brought to this square.

Gharst made his way up the stage, so he could speak to them. The sight of all of them was impressive.

"You have been spared" he started, and his voice started to echo across the city. "from the oppression of the Covenant. Thousands of others like you have been freed by the forces of the legion. However, while you might be free in body, your spirit, your will, has been bend by the monstrosity of the Covenant. You have a choice. You can walk away from here, and hope that the Covenant won't find you, torture you, and make you there slaves again. Or you can join us. Join us, and you won't have to fear them. Join us, and you will have your opportunity to strike back, and get what you deserve. Power. Resources. Join me, and we will _burn them all_!"

By now most of the prisoners were yelling, and a few were already headed to the ships, intend on joining up.

But, as with every major force, there were fools who would oppose. A single Sangheili stepped forward. "What of the other prisoners?"

Gharst looked the sceptic in the eye. "They were not fit. They're a virus, and must be exterminated."

The Elite moved closer. "Who gave you the right to judge us? Who is fit, and who is not? Who gave you the right!" he called. Most of the others were now looking at their fellow. One stepped forward.

"Shut up! I'm free because of them. I will not let you slander their authority!"

Gharst looked at the first speaker. "What is your name?"

"I am Thel Katam'ee." he responded. "I once led this world before Batonee came along. And what you are doing is shameful! HAVE YOU NO HONOR?" he rose in volume with every word he spoke. Gharst recognized his kind immediately. The most dangerous kind. The only ones who would oppose him with all their hearts.

Idealists.

"I see." he said, as he unholstered his pistol. He threw it at the second speaker. "Kill him."

The second speaker caught it, and shot Katam'ee in the head without hesitation. Gharst made a note to watch this one. He turned back to the crowd.

"His choice was clear. I will not tolerate disloyalty. There are no warnings. No second chances. Leave now if you cannot handle what I offer you."

the others all looked on, and in the end, all moved to the ships, which were of all varieties near the edges of the cities. Vultures, Liches, Phantoms, Spirits, Pelicans... you name any space-worthy transport up to the size of a Frigate and Gharst had at least one of them lined up to take the new recruits to the ships. Gharst moved back to his Falcon.

"Sweep of the planet's been completed." Recko reported. "The Fleet's in position. Your recruits are the only ones of ours left planetside. Everything else has been brought back up."

"Have you gotten what you looked for?" Gharst asked. He recalled Recko's mention of a particularity, and it could come in handy. Whatever it was.

"You could say that." Recko answered, and he let out a chuckle. "He's up with the Flagship."

Gharst nodded, and looked out over the city, as he got onto his Falcon and it lifted off. All transports containing recruits had taken off and were headed for the fleet.

"Jan" Gharst said. "Glass this rock."

Jan didn't answer. And he didn't need to. They had done this routine a dozen times before, at the other colonies. At the other planets of the Covenant.

At the others that housed traitors and murderers.

Gharst kept looking at the beauty of the planet being glassed until he got to the flagship, ironically called the Retribution by Recko when they acquired it.

A CSO-class Supercarrier.

* * *

The Colony of Ute'k Mardee was conquered in less than 24 hours. According to official data 78 soldiers were killed in action. All bodies were returned to the Fleet primary Cryo ship. In the course of the invasion the Legion has gained 30-40 Battle ready cruisers as well as a Supercarrier. The amount of raw materials and precious metals gained is unclear. Estimate loss of life on the colony varies. Some sources state 50.000, while others as much as 100.000. Estimated hostiles eliminated range 10.000 - 15.000 planet wide. The Glassing of the Planet started at 15:00 local time... and continued for the next 7 hours. Estimated civilian deaths range between 40.000 – 85.000. Glassing was stopped at 22:00 local time.

It was deemed pointless.

* * *

 **And so, the Legion gains support, growing in the shadows. and, when all has been taken that could be, they will move on to Larger prey.**

 **like the Covenant. and the UNSC.**

 **Gharst Omenlumin**


End file.
